Each year, as the year gets close to the end, I always wonder how can it be over already. It seems like only a few months have passed. I think working hard and working with something I love makes the time fly faster. I love creating both new art and new quilting/sewing designs so the days just whiz by.

Thinking ahead to the new year always brings thoughts of new resolutions. But by January 10th or so (if that long), they are usually forgotten as I’ve settled back into my normal daily routine. So, I’ve settled on one word for next year’s resolution – TRY. That’s all one can do, and my “try” will be trying some new things and some new directions as well expanding on the things I’m already doing. OK, I know there’s only so many hours in the day to “try” to squeeze my new resolution in, but there are some 2-word sub-resolutions that can help, “Better Organization” or “Less Sleep” (I really don’t like the last one so I need to work on the first).

TRY reminds me of an old saying “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again”. I’m not quite sure I like that saying because you don’t have to fail or not succeed to keep trying. By trying, you can improve on something good or successful. TRY can also cover a multitude of plans, from trying to be a better person to trying to keep my plants alive by remembering to water them.

Thinking back over the past year, I am thankful for many things. Foremost, I’m thankful for my family and friends. My son moved back to Birmingham this year, to my delight, so I get to see him much more often. I enjoyed spending more time with other members of my family as well as friends.

I am thankful for all of you who read my blog, comment or send me emails. You all mean more to me than you know!

I wish each of you a great and Happy New Year, peace and happiness!  I hope your wishes and dreams come true!

Phyllis

I wish each of you the merriest of Christmases and happiest of holidays. Enjoy the time with and love of family and friends. Take a moment to think of the blessings in your life.

And be safe in your travels.

Phyllis

The holidays are rapidly approaching but there’s still time to create some great craft projects to help with decorating and entertaining. I want to share one of my earlier Christmas craft projects that is so quick and easy to make and has so many uses – the versatile terra cotta flower pot painted in holiday colors.

This painted flower pot can be used to hold food like cookies and candy (line the pot with a napkin first so that the food doesn’t touch the paint). For decorating use, it can hold ornaments or a plant. The size of pot that you use can also determine the use. A small 3 or 4 inch pot can be filled with food or small gift and given as a gift, or placed by the plates at a dinner party as a favor. Simply line with cellophane, tissue paper or fabric, add a food item or other small gift, bunch at the top and tie with a ribbon. Let your imagination come up with many more uses.

I used red and white for Christmas (which can also double as my school colors), but you can use other colors for different holidays – red, white and blue for the 4th of July, shades of green for St. Patrick’s Day, bright fun colors for a birthday, pastels for Easter, and so on. I also painted a flower pot for Halloween.

Easy peasy! I used a very simple design that is very easy to draw.

Wash the flower pot and go over it with alcohol to disinfect it.  With a pencil draw the lines for the stripes around the rim and draw 1/2″ circles randomly below the rim (or create your own design). Paint as shown in the photo.  I recommend painting one color at a time, allowing it to dry before painting with the second color. The white dots on the stripe were added last, after all drying. When all the paint is dry, seal with a coat of clear satin acrylic.

Enjoy!

Phyllis

Sew a quick Christmas apron in just a couple of hours and wear it tonight! Aprons are fun and trendy to both sew and wear! I designed this free apron pattern to wear for Christmas cooking and enertaining. Designed for an earlier post here on my blog, I wanted to share the apron pattern  again. Its so easy to make.

To start sewing, download your free Christmas apron pattern here!

Thinking of Christmas aprons brings thoughts of all the wonderful smells of food cooking, cinnamon, and other spices. I also think of the citrus smell of oranges.

Enjoy both sewing and wearing it!

Phyllis

I wish each of you a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday. In remembering the true meaning of the words “thanks giving”, I think of all the things in my life that I give thanks for. Remembering the positive will suppress any negatives we might have. You can have only one thought at a time so concentrating on the positive will brighten our days.

At the top of my list, I am thankful for all the love and joy given to me by family and friends. The people we are in contact with, whether on a daily basis or much more infrequently, shape just about every aspect of our lives. For those who have passed from my life, I am ever thankful for their love and the cherished memories that will never fade.

I am thankful for all of you who read my blog and again wish you a wonderful and safe holiday!

Phyllis

I have been working on a St. Patrick’s Day design for celebration of St. Patrick (also the birthday of one of my nephews). These are now on products in my Zazzle store.  Everything is customizable.

Kiss Me – I’m Irish Women’s Keds shoes by phyllisdobbs
customize your own sneaker at zazzle

My store is loaded with various products that you can use to proclaim St. Patrick’s day, including a mousepad, tote bags, invitations, aprons, stickers, iPad and iPhone covers, men’s ties and much more. I even have some items for little Leprechauns.

Kiss Me – I’m a Little Bit Irish Mousepad by phyllisdobbs
View more mousemats on zazzle

For those of you aren’t Irish, you can be “Irish for a Day”.

Kiss Me – I’m Irish for A Day Tote Bag by phyllisdobbs
Create photo bags from zazzle

Here’s wishing you the “Luck of the Irish”!
Phyllis

I wish each of you a wonderful Valentine’s Day!

And I want to share my very first Valentine. My mother was great at keeping things and I found my first Valentine in some things she kept for me. This card* was sent to me by my dad on my first Valentine Day. And I guess you can call it a mixed media card since the tuff of hair on the girl is some type of fiber.

Its wonderful looking throught all the saved things from my early years, thing I would not know about or remember.

Have a wonderful day and keep your treasured cards!

Phyllis

* The card copyright ownership is Rust Craft of Boston.

If  you are like me, you are wondering where did 2010 go!  It certainly doesn’t seem like its been a year since I looked forward to greeting 2010. Time flies so quickly and the seasons, Christmas and holidays zip by! I meant to accomplish so much this year, and I did accomplish more than I thought possible, but I didn’t get to the bottom of my 2010 To Do list. However, my lists are always longer than humanly possible to accomplish. So I will do what I do with all my lists, roll the items I didn’t cross off onto the next list. I will say that close to the top of my list is to move all chocolate out of my sight, then I can move onto my work related items.

But at the VERY top of my list is to extend the biggest and warmest THANK YOU for visiting my blog! And for those who emailed me or posted comments, I loved hearing from you and would love to hear from bunches of you in the future!

I hope that each of you had a wonderful 2010 and I wish you a very, very happy and healthy 2011!

Phyllis

I love books and while browsing through books, I found these 2 that are fabulous for creating spectacular gift wrapping. The books have different methods of creating wraps and I fell in love with both of them. And they offer fantastic wrapping techniques that can be used right now during “the wrapping season”.

Uniquely Gifted by Eleanor J. Leinen with beautiful photography by Marc Vaughn shows you how to create a work of art with each gift. Whether you are a crafter or not, you can find yourself creating beautiful gifts with things you already have on hand or can easily purchase. Items such as ribbons, fabrics and papers are combined with such items as old jewelry, tassels, trims, beads, silk flowers, beads, and many more items to create these beautiful wrappings.

Since each wrapping is very unique, instructions are not provided. But with all the “stuff” we have in our stashes, we can follow Eleanor’s inspiration to create our own works of art. Creating them with a box or giftbag that can be opened without damage to our artistic endeavors will allow our work of art to remain intact and a gift in itself. This is a fun book and I plan to create works of art with my wrapping from now on!

The Wrapping Scarf Revolution by Patricia Lee offers a different method of wrapping by creating gorgeous wrapping scarfs from fabrics. The wrapping scarf can be used over and over which is very economical.

The book is filled with easy-to-follow diagrams of the many different styles of wraps, including wrap bags. You just choose the fabric you want and start creating wraps adding embellishments as you desire. I have a huge stash of fabric and plan to also put the techniques in this book to use.

A wrapping scarf can also allow you to create a tradition when swapping presents back and forth using a special scarf – from friend to friend, mother to daughter, sister to sister.

I love both books so please check back. I will show you projects that I create using the techniques of both books. (My mind is already whirling away with ideas!)

For full disclosure, I purchased both books.

Here’s to pretty wrappings and a happy holidays!

Phyllis

Christmas is such a special time of the year with all the activities and gatherings of family and friends. Keep the memories of your Chistmas holiday each year by journaling in a Christmas journal.

Our 4th week of the Sizzix Triple Play blog hop is the Frame and Frame back die by Eileen Hull. There are so many uses for this die, especially this time of the year for Christmas photos.  I chose to use it to create and decorate a Christmas journal.

To make the journal, you will need the following materials:

Frame and Frame Back, 3D Pro Scoreboards Die #656835 by Eileen Hull

Heavy card stock

Journal

Green fabric

Red and green acrylic paints

Adhesive – Zip Dry by Beacon

Instructions:

Cut the fabric 2″ larger than the opened journal on all sides.  Center the journal and fold the fabric edges to the inside the cover, fold the raw edge back and glue. Cut fabric pieces out along the edge of the spine.

Paint the frame pieces solid red, red stripes and red dots.

Paint a Christmas tree or other motif centered on the bottom frame.  Align the frame pieces and glue them together.  Turn the small red frame turned catercorner. Glue the completed frame centered on the journal.

Be sure to hop to the other blogs to see an assortment of outstanding and unique uses for this die.  Just click on the Sizzix button in the sidebar and hop forward to the next blog.

Thanks for visiting and enjoy the hop!

Phyllis