July 2008 – Page 3 – Karla's Cottage

Happy Fourth!

celebrations, family, Food and Drink, Sugarwings

By Karla Nathan / July 5, 2008

Happy 4th of July weekend! I hope you are all having a good one. Mine is filled with Sugarwings, boating, yard work and pickle making.

This is my first ever attempt at canning, and it seemed to be way too easy. There must be some botulism lurking somewhere in these jars, because it just seemed too simple to do.

My biggest problem in canning was getting the labels right. These are too big, I’ll need to make more if I do more pickles this week.

And what do you do with a baby while you are trying to make pickles and she wants to help?

We sat up her art table in the kitchen and gave her some cucumber stump "stamps".

I cut the end of a cuke, carved a design in it with a knife, then let her ink it up with her washable markers.

They really made pretty stamps, with a watercolor effect. And it kept the fairy grand baby pretty happy while her daddy and I chopped and pickled.

This year, fireworks were shot off over Lake Clinton where we keep our boat. The air was cool, the stars were out, and the water was calm, a perfect evening for watching the exploding colors in the sky.

We parked far away from the dozens of boats tied up together, so it was like a private light show of our own.

Now, off to do some yard work and take advantage of this unexpected mild weather, not typical at all for July in Kansas!

How to become a fairy, and the Hat Whisperer strikes again!

antiques/junking, celebrations, fairies, family, how to's, Silver Bella, Travel

By Karla Nathan / July 3, 2008

At a sweet shop in St Augustine, I picked up a bag of Key Lime Pie hard candies. I can’t belive I still have this many left, they are so good and they remind me of the beach every time I pop one into my mouth!

I miss the beach!

So while my mind is still lingering in vacation mode, I made some scrapbooks to send to Bobbie, Sissy, Randy and Kevin as a momento of our trip.

By the way, the bikini babe is my Sissy who is in her SIXTIES. She’s always been a teeny tiny thing.

One day while sitting on our balcony and watching a storm roll in across the ocean, we saw a rabbit hop across the sand.

That is why I turned these pages into "beach bunnies". I didn’t know there were rabbits on the beach. I thought that all those long eared hopping rodents lived in my yard and were busy at home eating my plants while I was on vacation.

I filled the books with lots of memories of the trip.

This cute, scallopey edged card stock comes in a package at Michaels. One $9.95 package made 4 scrap books, with some left to make at least one more.

I used my binding machine to put the pages together into a book after they were decorated.

Here is how I turned us into fairies:

I made 5×7 copies of a picture of Randy’s garden and wallet sized copies of a photo of the three of us, then cut us out.

Hosta leaves in the garden photo were cut away with an exacto knife. I cut around the plant, so that I could lift the foliage and slide our picture underneath.

Before gluing the photo down, I spritzed Glimmer Mist on watercolor paper, glued the cut out picture of us to it, then drew on wings and cut it all out.

Once the wings were done, I slid the sister picture under the hosta leaves in the garden picture and glued it all in place, then glittered and dood dadded it up.

On Bobbie Sue’s album, she is holding a magic wand, on Sissy’s she has one to hold. I used vintage stick pins for wands and just poked them through the photo at an angle and added a drop of glue.

I tried to add a lot of hand drawn elements, like lady bugs and vines on the pages that show us setting a bag of lady bugs free in the garden to control pests.

Randy raises butterflies, so can’t use any chemicals out there.

I used a lot of Glimmer Mist some pages before adding photos, and did all the writing and drawing with metallic or sparkling pens, so the books have some shimmer to them.

While in St. Augustine, I put my Hat Whispering skills to work.

Most vintage hats I saw in this touristy area were EXPENSIVE. $38-$200!!! My goodness. Lots of hats were in these antique shops, but few were in my price range.

While in one fancy antique mall, the hat search looked hopeless, but I told my sisses that I felt one upstairs, and walked up the stairs, around the corner and into a back room right to it. Loaded with pink and red velvet roses, it wasn’t cheap, but it was affordable and beautiful and some how it had called out to me.

I bought only 3 hats all week, for $4, $9, and $15. But, it does go to show that even in a high dollar shopping area, with the right hat hunting skills, millinery flowers can be affordable!

I kept my souvenir shopping to a minimum. 3 hats, lots of candy, these two shells, and a handful of old charms. Oh, and a pink St. Augustine hoody. I love trashy tee shirts and sweat shirts from tourist trap shops.

The shell necklace pictured IS NOT from a tacky shell shop!!

It is hand made over 80 years ago by my great aunt, Caroline. The lovely box was hers too. She gave me those years ago, along with the turquoise pendant that was her mother’s and the wonderful green glass bead necklace that her grandfather made. Yep, lucky, lucky me!!

Speaking of lucky- I got all the classes I signed up for at Sliver Bella! I was at the keyboard the minute sign ups began. Here is what I signed up for:

Secret Santa Diary/Pam Garrison, Saturday 1:00pm

Home for the Holidays/Pam Garrison, Friday 11:30 am

Christmas Pageant/Teresa McFayden, Saturday 8:30
am

Soldering For Virgins/Sally Jean, Friday 8:00am

Winter Faerie Shrine/Kim Kwan, Saturday 1:00 pm

Total 510.00

Yes, the price went up this year, but it is worth it!! If you haven’t booked your trip yet, do it now before it is full, I can promise you it will be FUN.

A fairy wonderland garden and a Prize Pack Giveaway

celebrations, Etsy Goodies, fairies, family, flowers, give away, Sugarwings

By Karla Nathan / July 1, 2008

See why I am glad to be home? I missed my Sugarwings. She had a sleepover last night and we played tea party with her dolls and then this morning she let me semi-French braid her hair. I think her hair grew while I was gone.

After the fairy grand baby left to go home, I listed a few things on etsy, wrapped packages, and got some things ready to mail.

These are the gifts that I am sending out to the 8 winners of the drawing from the pool of card makers.

Sandy, Melissa, and Sherry– I still need your addresses. Jen, Lili, Alice, Irma, and Robin should be expecting something in the mail soon, theirs is on its way.

Thanks again to everyone for their help! And here is a note from my great Aunt Caroline’s niece, Caroline Beth, who hosted the 100th birthday party:

Our Aunt Caroline had the BEST birthday!

Most of the praise goes to all of you who donated your time and effort to show so much love and affection for a lady you’ve never even met. What a heartfelt effort!

Thanks to Karla and her sisters who were "everything" to her on her special day. She’ll talk about this forever and we’ll be delighted to listen.

All of us who were lucky enough to spend the day with Caroline were amazed at her vitality and glowing disposition. You could watch as she gained even more positive energy from her well-wishers. The cards sent a huge burst of appreciation for a life well lived and a lady well loved.

We can’t thank you enough for the blessings, thoughtfulness, and amazing beauty of your creations.

God bless you all.

Carolyn Beth ( another of Caroline’s nieces)

Caroline’s birthday wasn’t the only one we celebrated while in Florida on our Sister Trip.

We got to spend time with my brother-in-law, Randy the Birthday Boy Nathan, who lives in a house filled with antiques, laughter, and fun plus a magical garden full of fairies. 100th_birthday_florida_005

Around every corner there is a surprise in this yard.

Its full of whimsical elements and beautiful blooms.

Not one inch of space goes to waste here. To make it seem larger, there are winding paths that keep you guessing about what is around the corner, and a mirror is hung on the bright red garden gate (I want to try that trick!).

This old iron railing was picked up at a garage sale, and re-purposed to become trellises.

It seemed like everywhere I looked, there was a smiling face looking back at me!

More garage sale finds brighten up this corner. The shiny thing hanging in the foreground is a chandelier found in the trash and taken apart to add some sparkle to the garden, since sparkly things attract fairies.

See, I told you so!

And the fairies have shelter on rainy days, here in this vase turned on its side and tucked under the foliage.

Randy and Kevin’s garden is a vacation in itself! I could spend all week just exploring all the nooks and crannies there.

My sisses and I spent a day crafting with Randy, (that explains the blue, glitter encrusted fingers). Then we spread lady bugs around the garden to eat pests, this lush landscape is not only beautiful, it is chemical free!

Our craft day consisted of making fairy pages for each other. This is what I did for Sissy. She and I both love the smell of Birthday Cake scented candles sold at Kohl’s and have had some serious bonding time while sipping wine and burning a cake candle, so the background of her fairy page is of sprinkled frosting.

Bobbie Sue is deep into genealogy, so the fairy page for her is made from photos of my great grandfather and his brothers glued to a copy of some hand written family history.

And after seeing Randy’s back yard, you’ll understand why I made a fairy gardener on "I love you" paper for him.

My little friend and fellow fairy lover, Adeline Grace, is turning 7 this week, so when I saw a poem in an old book, titled "Adeline" I cut it out and made a faery birthday card for her with the poem glued inside.

The best vacations are ones where I get to make things, so I loved my crafting day, and also my chances to play in the sand and make a "Twinkle".

Ooops, I almost forgot to announce the winner of June’s Garage Sailing Giveaway Prize Pack-

it goes to:

Amy

Thanks to everyone who left a comment and entered the drawing. Remember, all the July comments go toward a prize too!

100 happy years

celebrations, family, give away, Travel, tributes

By Karla Nathan / July 1, 2008

I miss the beach already. But it is good to be home and have little Sugarwings back in my arms again. Her hippy chick mommy let my fairy grand baby come and have a sleep over tonight since I missed her so much.

But while I was away from Little Sugarwings, my sisses and brother were fun play mates.

Sissy, Bobbie Sue, and I did sand sculptures, picnicked on our balcony over looking the ocean, and shopped, shopped, shopped between family visits.

We danced on the beach in the dark wearing glow sticks too. No, I wasn’t drunk at the time, and even though you probably think I must be quite soused to do this, I am not drunk now when I am posting this photo of a 50 year old granny in a swim suit with a glow stick in her cleavage. Good thing the beach was deserted, I am not the graceful sort and dance a bit like a delirious cow. One decidedly ungraceful ballerina-esque jump had me landing flat on my back in the sand.

As wonderful as the trip was, the highlight of course, was Great Aunt Caroline. Now, that is one graceful, gorgeous, and gracious lady.

She is so sharp, entertaining, and full of stories, it was a delight to listen to her speak with such wit and charm. At 100, she can still tell a tale that has a whole room enthralled from beginning to end.

She was touched by all of the cards, and couldn’t get over the fact that so much time and work went into them.

She has been making beautiful things all of her life, and that cane next to her is a good example. She told us how she collected drift wood from the beach, cleaned and polished and decorated a piece to make this cane.

The painting that I am pointing to was done by Aunt Caroline’s mother, my great grandmother.

And we heard stories that day about how my great-great-grandfather was an artist too. He was a farmer who made beaded jewelry in his spare time. He also collected shells from the beach and hand wired them together into curtains for his parlor. Caroline remembers the tinkling of the shells as the breeze blew them together.

Our Sister Trip was priceless, and the visit to our aunt’s 100th birthday was just the best, and all of your cards helped make it even more special.

Caroline remembered the dress she was wearing in this photo that so many of us used in the cards and was pleased to see it. She told us about making it herself, that in the 30s, all of her clothes were hand made.

For the party, I wore the pearls that she had on in the photo and she also recognized those and told me she appreciated me taking such good care of them. Like I had done something nice for her??? She is really something sweet.

This darling lady is one of those people that looks you in the eyes and makes you think that you have to be the most special person on the planet. She has a sincere caring quality about her that just melts your heart when you meet her.

Since she was so touched by the cards everyone made, I wanted to show you my appreciation by adding a few more prizes to the drawing.

All the cards pictured today are by the people whose names were randomly drawn.

Jen, Alice, Robin, Lili, Melissa, Sherry, Irma, and Sandy, please send me your addresses and I will send you a thank you prize.

I just wish I could do something for all of you for doing this kind and thoughtful thing for my aunt!

As Caroline said when she blew out her candles, "I wish you all this many happy years!"