Christmas in August

Although it could be Christmas in July, since these are a few of the ornaments we added to our collection when we went to Bronner's Christmas Wonderland in Frankenmuth, Michigan, in July. I'm just showing them to you in August.

I opted to show you the glass ball ornaments today. This is the Bronner's annual ornament. I just thought it was beautiful. I don't typically buy dated ornaments, but this one was too pretty to pass up.

In honor of Hubby's 20-year military career:

In honor of our 25th anniversary we celebrated in June:

For more Show and Tell Friday, visit Cindy at My Romantic Home!

Front Yard Beautification

I love putting pretty, bright flowers out in the spring.

Of course now that I live in Michigan that means waiting until late in May or early in June so they don't die.

Some places I've lived I've planted them in early or mid-April, sometimes even late March. But having definite seasons and nice, cool summers are worth the trade-off.

Now that we have the front landscaping (done last summer) I did more than just put some impatiens in pots on the porch.

This pot has lots of different flowers that require full sun. They were ones I liked when I was browsing through the flower selections and thought I could put together in one gigantic pot.

This pot ended up with my leftover impatiens and one of the other full sun flowers. I should have kept those little sticks with the names.

This is another full sun spot. I have those requisite gerbera daisies (they came just like this!) and another small pot with some flowers requiring full sun.

The requisite impatiens on the front porch. There are matching pots on the other side.

I also planted three little perennial plants in the bed. I don't have a great picture of those, but they are behind the bright purple in this picture and left of the rock. But it's before the bushiest blue-green bush in the back. I do remember their name — moonbeam.

Some overall views:

It's always nice to come home!

This post is linked to Show & Tell Friday hosted by Cindy at My Romantic Home.

Navajo Dolls

Hubby has traveled a lot to El Paso in the last couple of months. There is a shop in the airport that sells handmade Navajo dolls by local artists. He decided to get something new for my doll collection.

Her tag in the back has the local artist's name and number (it's actually a certificate of authenticity) and then gives a little bit of history behind the Navajo and the women's dress.

Diné, "The People," as the Navajo call themselves, live today on the largest Indian reservation in the United States. Much of the Navajo lifestyle has been passed down from generation to generation unchanged from ancient times.

Many men and women wear the traditional velveteen tops decorated with silver and turquoise. The women's skirts are long full skirts of either velveteen or calico. The Navajo are well-known for their sandpainting, silversmithing, and rug weaving.

He also got me this Navajo Cradleboard.

There is also a card attached to the cradleboard/doll:

Traditionally, Navajo cradleboards carry and protect Navajo babies. The cradleboard is used during the baby's first year - until he or she is ready to walk. The arch across the top, called the rainbow, protects the baby's head. The bands securing the child are commonly called lightning. They comfortably keep the baby in place. Usually the cradleboards are made of cedar or juniper. They are passed down from child to child within families.

Here's a cradleboard link with information and a picture from around 1936. I looked around on the internet because I wondered how they looked with a real baby after Hubby brought this home for me. Also, after my initial thought that the Navajo used the cradleboard to carry the baby on their back, we decided that there really wasn't a way to strap it around the person carrying it. We were apparently very wrong.

Makes what you can buy at Babies 'r Us and places like that look pretty comfy.

I love my new dolls. Other than the one Sparky got me from Africa, it's been years since I've added to my childhood collection.

For more Show and Tell Friday, visit Cindy at My Romantic Home.

Childhood

Before I was born my mom had moved back in with my grandparents and aunt since my dad was overseas in the war. Even though they lived within the city limits, my grandparents' next door neighbors had goats and chickens (not too many chickens to make it that smelly). Their names were the Christensen's, and he was German and didn't talk too much. She was the one that enjoyed having all the neighborhood kids come over when we were older and let us feed the baby goats. She fed us cookies and would give us goat's milk. Unfortunately I didn't care for the goat's milk since it was unpasteurized and the cookies usually had raisins in them.

This little blue bear is what they gave me when I was born.

I can always remember having this puzzle (glued on a piece of cardboard) in my room from when I was about seven or so. I think it's sweet and very true.

When I was probably about five or six, it was all the rage to make artwork on burlap wrapped backing (this is cardboard) and use plain yarn glued on in long lengths for the picture. I can remember a huge one my mom did that I think was hanging in my sister's room (she would have been a baby since she was born right before I turned five). It could have been hanging in my room. Mom, I'm starting to forget things. Eek! I suppose I wanted to make one too. This one went to my grandma's sister, my aunt Annabelle, and then at some point came back to us.

I like being able to record this on my blog so my kids will know where these treasures came from too.

Visit Cindy at My Romantic Home for Show and Tell Friday.

Ivory

My grandparents went on a visit to the Holy Land in 1975.

My mom recently looked in their three pictures albums they had from the trip and read me their itinerary. They hopped all over the place and back again. Today I'm sharing one of the things they brought back for me.

It's a red letter New Testament with ivory overlaying not only the front, but the back. What you see is individually pieced.



You can tell here in my hand that it's fairly small.

The inscription is the most precious part.

It has my name (maiden, of course) and then my grandparents' names below that.

For more Show and Tell Friday treasures, visit Cindy at My Romantic Home.

Orange, Fuchsia, and a Machete

There were people coming by daily to sell things when Sparky was in Africa. It wasn't random though; it was planned.

At the beginning of the week a lady came by. If they wanted a bag made they were to pick small, medium, or large, and the two-color combination they wanted.

Sparky picked large and my favorite color combo, orange and fuchsia (although blue is my single favorite color).

Matches my Bible like a charm!

Look at all the intricate work.

I wish you could feel this bag. The person or people that make these bags must have very tough, calloused hands or very cut up hands. You know that white plastic rope that is stiff? It's like that but a thousand times stiffer. (Kind of like comparing Elmer's to Super Glue.) Yet it is woven tight like normal string would be woven. I can't even imagine how they do it.

Hubby got a cool gift. It was 'the only thing' Sparky could think of that he would like.

Remember that lady selling machetes in her Togo pictures? That's who she purchased this machete from.

I took a picture of it with my Blackberry so you could see how big it really is.

The kids feel pretty safe in the house now too.

For more Show and Tell Friday, visit Cindy at My Romantic Home (plus she lives in California and it's green there already!).

Africa Souvenirs

Sparky brought some neat souvenirs home from Togo, so we thought we'd share those for Show and Tell this week.

The ladies got to go to the market early in the week. She bought these bracelets and necklace at the market. They are made from animal bones.

There were people who came through during the week and sold things. She purchased some fabric and then you might remember me showing you the picture of the lady who made her dress. That was with the fabric she bought.

If you've read my blog much, you will remember that Sparky has issues with clothes being fancy. A v-neck on a plain t-shirt makes it fancy. Well, she had to make a big decision with this dress on the neckline. She could have just left it without the extra stitching at the top, but she was worried it would be too plain! It even has some pink thread up there. I think she made a good choice.

Mrs. Smith, the older lady that worked with them in the kitchen, purchased a wooden chicken one day from a man that came through selling some wooden items. It came with five little chickens, and they all had spots painted on them. She gave the other three ladies (girls) one of the little chickens to remember her by.

I've never quite seen a chicken like that one.

One day they went to the "blind shop". She picked up these two hand-carved wooden elephants for her brothers.

And she also got me this doll for my doll collection.

She got me this hand-carved giraffe from one of the men who came through and sold things where they were staying, since it's my favorite zoo animal.

There was a young man named Mawilly (which I am spelling phonetically) that she helped prepare things for prior to the children coming over each day (separate from the hospital work). He made jewelry, and she purchased the two plainer necklaces from him, and then he let her pick out one of her choice for helping him. She picked out the one that has the larger beads on it. She said he spoke pretty good English too.

I have a couple more souvenirs that I'll share later. One is lost in Mr. Churchmember's suitcase (it's Hubby's), but it is in New York now. I also have matching bags that Sparky got for me and Chatty I forgot to take a picture of, and she got Hubby and me some coffee.

I'm going to do what Julie in Australia suggested and have her work on a guest post. If you have a specific question you'd like her to answer about her mission trip, please leave it in the comments.

For more Show and Tell Friday, visit Cindy at My Romantic Home.

A Thing for Grandma Moses' Art

Did you read my Show and Tell post about The Whole Hole Picture?

Well, if not, here is the picture. A Grandma Moses' print I found at one of the local Salvation Army stores.

You'll have to go back and read the post though to hear about the reframing transformation and the hole it's covering.

It got me thinking back then that there might be more prints out there. So I checked out ebay and found a set of eight prints. Let's just say I got them for practically nothing.

When they came, the overall prints were the same size, but the images were varying sizes depending on how they had shrunk them to maintain their proportion. That made going to the store and just picking out a ready-made mat and frame and doing it myself more difficult.

Which basically means impossible.

Good thing the stores have killer sales sometimes on framing. I picked two of my favorites that were close to the same image size and had them framed. Here they are:

They share the same room with "The Hole Picture" Grandma Moses' print and also my Grandma Moses' cross-stitch, which is across the room.

Visit Cindy at My Romantic Home every week for Show and Tell Friday.