A Little Fall Jewelry

Today was my day to get my teeth cleaned.  Don't know what got into me today but I kept laughing.  The roof of my mouth was so ticklish.  Love my hygienist she does the best job and today kept me laughing.

  I have been wanting some acorn jewelry for awhile so a few days ago I sent away for 3 acorn caps. 

When they arrived I went to my local jewelry supply store and found 3 labradorite beads and 3 green crystals to go with them.

I made a pair of earrings and coordinating necklace using copper colored chain and jump rings, etc.

Copper reminds me of the warmth of Fall fires and falling leaves.

And while at the bead store I found 3 rich colored pearls and matching crystals for another Fall set.

Happy Crafting!

A Day at Apple Hill

We spent the day at Apple Hill up in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains here in California.

This has been a yearly tradition since I was a kid. Used to live about 5 miles away.  Now it is a 45 minute drive.  But we still go every year.

Each year from late September through Christmas all the apple orchards are open to the public. Apples, crafts, and other Fall goodies are all for sale.  And when December rolls around the Christmas trees farms in the area are open.  It is so much fun after a snow to drive up there and hike out into the tree farm to cut just the right tree for Christmas.

Apples of all varieties are available.  Each orchard has a wonderful selection to choose from.

Today was a perfect day, temperatures where in the upper 70's with lots of beautiful sunshine and tons of apples and other fresh produce that has just been picked. I came home with some gorgeous, huge fresh tomatoes, too.

A few friendly face here and there

This was a huge bin of apple peels left over from the making all those fresh pies and caramel apples.

Here is the apple peeling machine.  Apples peeled in a couple of seconds, amazing to watch.

I always love the fresh caramel apples.  Each year I usually by one.  Oh so good.  You know it is Fall for sure when the caramel apples show up.

Craft Vendors among the pine forest.

Apple orchard across from vendors

This was such a cute swing made to look like a wagon seat between two wagon wheels and lanterns on each side.  I want one in my yard.

Everyone stops at the pie house to get a slice of apple pie and order pies for the Holidays.

Loved these boxes of gourds.  I was thinking of all the stuff I could make out of them.

Happy Halloween Everyone.

 Stay safe and enjoy the day.

Black Spider Web Lantern

Here is a quick craft that would be cute on a windowsill, table or part of a front porch display for Halloween. (It was hard to get a good photo, black doesn't show up well.)

I started out with just an empty glass jar, like the ones spaghetti sauce comes in. I ran it through the dishwasher to make sure there was no greasy residue left on the glass.  I wanted the paint to adhere well.  Next  I drew a spider web on a piece of copy paper that I had cut down to fit the jar and taped it to the inside with the web facing out.  Using my hot glue gun I traced over the lines of the web and let it cool.  I used my hot glue gun with a fine tip. 

empty jar

Spidy on the jar

   Next I painted the entire jar, including the lid, black.  I just happened to have chalkboard paint handy, but I am sure any black acrylic paint would work.  I thought that since the chalkboard paint is a little thicker I wouldn't need more than one coat of paint.  Some areas I did end up giving a second coat of paint.  

Spooky Lantern at night

But didn't  completely cover the jar with a heavy coat of paint.  I left some areas thinner to allow the light to show through. 

 When the paint was dry I used my hot glue gun to adhere the fuzzy spider, that I bought at The Dollar Store,  to the lantern making sure not to glue the lid so I could insert a battery operated tea light inside.

A little sunshine in my day

A few days ago the fires in California where raging so much and the smoke was so heavy everything looked sad. So, I painted myself a happy little sunflower to brighten my day.

I feel for all those who lost homes and life in the fire area.  I pray for their healing and recovery. The fires raged through my beloved Gold Rush County, blackening the beautiful terrain I spent my youth exploring.  I hope the area can make a speedy recovery.

 Starting last night rain began to fall on water starved California.  It is such a welcome site.  It is still raining this morning.  What a wonderful site and smell.  Almost forgot how nice the air smells during and after a rain.

Anniversary Trip

We got away to the middle of nowhere.  Actually we stayed at Sorensen's Resort in Beautiful Hope Valley, CA.  No cable, no internet, no TV.  And almost unchanged from the time the first settlers came out West.  I have heard if you fly over the area you can still see the wagon ruts from the early wagon trains moving west over The Emigrant Trail.  So many animals and wagon wheels rolled over that the ground and it is so compressed nothing grows in those ruts.

Back to our stay. There are 35 cabins at Sorensen's nestled in the woods among the Whispering Aspen.  So peaceful and beautiful. The first night there a group of us from different cabins had a huge bonfire and ate S'more and talked into the night.

One night we had a Marmot on the steps.

 The property was so gorgeous and these two topiaries where sitting by the pond fishing.  There where others climbing trees.  Really cute. And all made by a local artist.

One day we drove over to Lake Tahoe.  Beautiful day but the wind was howling at 35 MPH with whitecaps on the water. The next  day we went to Genoa, Nevada.  It is the oldest settlement in Nevada.  While there I checked out all the Antiques Shops.  Something I love to do. In one of the shops I found this 100 year old ladies writing desk.  I fell in love instantly and best of all it was marked down half price.  I found my Anniversary present.  I just love it and adore the 8 little claw feet.

So I moved our luggage around in the SUV, in it went and came home with me. Thank you hubby for the great Anniversary gift.

For right now I am going to use it for my sewing table.  May later I will use it in the center of the room for a desk because the backside is as beautiful and the front.

Colors of Fall Earrings

Looking forward to crackling fires, hot chocolate and falling leaves.

Time to get  Fall clothes ready in rich browns oranges and other earth tones.  Here are a few pair of earrings I made for the season.

Love to go to craft shows and this next weekend is the beginning of the season in my area.  And then we will make plans to go to Apple Hill.  Every fall the apple orchards all open for selling fruit and more craft shows.

Halloween Book Of Spells

Well,  the calendar may say it is Fall.  But it is already 91*.  I am so ready for some cooler weather and hopefully the end to our terrible drought.  We need rain so badly.  The whole state of California is  either turning brown or catching on fire.  Heard on the news that our over 2,000 year old Sequoia trees are in danger of dying if rain doesn't arrive soon and bring a good snow pack this year.

But back to crafting.  This is my Halloween "Book of Spells."

I used a very large old dictionary.  First I took a hammer to the edges and corners to give it an aged appearance.   I used Tim Hotlz Black Distress Ink on the edge of the pages.  Next I printed out the words Book of Spells in a font that I thought looked old and spooky.  I tore around the edges and glued that to the front of the book, traced over the lettering with hot glue from my fine tip glue gun.

Cover

Next I tore a sheet of white card stock, glued it around the words, ruffling and curling the edges to make it look like the book cover was peeling to reveal the spell book title.  Probably would have been easier to use black but that is all I had at the time. Along the bottom I hot glued on a piece of lace.  Next I painted the entire book flat black using an acrylic paint .  The mirrored wand is just and vintage spoon I flattened and glued a small beveled edge mirror to.  Then aged the mirror with alcohol inks. I cut a spider web with a Martha Stewart punch by the spoon and around the dragon's eye. For the dragon's eye I made a little paper window and glued an image of a dragon's eye that I printed off Google Images under the window. Then used Glossy Accents to make the eye shiny.  On the front and back edges I glued an old leather watch band that you unbuckle to open the book.  And covered the end of the band on the front with a tiny vintage doily and canvas button.  When everything was dry I used my finger to highlight all the raised areas with Antique gold Rub and Buff.  

Have this sitting on my coffee among the faux fall foliage.  Makes a neat conversation piece.

Mirrored Wand

Dragon's Eye

Closure

                         

Spine of Book

Hope you are having fun getting ready for Fall.

Quilted Scarecrow

Time to fill the house with thoughts of fall.  This guy is about 4 feet tall and he hangs on a door.  He is stitched from a fabric panel cut apart filled with light fiber fill.  I stitched over some of the lines to give him a quilted look. I then added a couple of bows and some golden red yarn fibers for his hair.  He makes me smile every time I pass that door.

Hair Detail

Halloween Configuration Box

Fall is in the air and my thoughts turn to Halloween Crafts.  Here a configuration box I recently completed using a single sheet of Graphic 45 Rare Oddities paper.  I added dyed cheese cloth for webs, handmade flowers and little bottles filled with different spices to resemble medicines. Coated all the shiny stuff in the background with Glossy Accents and a few orange rhinestones and a couple of peacock feathers.  Lots of little odds and ends from my stash where used throughout.  The glow that you see between the boxes was created using single strands of peacock feathers glued along the seams.

Detail view of bottles

Top View

Both Sides

Back View