family – Page 49 – Karla's Cottage

Family Reunion Fun Times Two

By Karla Nathan / August 26, 2012

This photo is from my Sissy, of her page for our swap book. Its just gorgeous, done with beautiful things. She says she used "the Good Stuff" like I always harp about! The fabric under the sheet music and on the fairy herself is cut from a beaded 1920s flapper dress. I saw the gown last time I was at her house, its truly wonderful. I can't wait to see this page in person.

Here is the back. Pretty, huh?

I probably wouldn't be an artist if I hadn't had my two big sisters. As a kid, I always loved Bobbie Sue's paintings. And as an adult, Sissy showed me many tricks and had beautiful examples on how to make life prettier by adding lovely details to your surroundings.

This photo is from my trip to see them last year. I've pre-posted this, and will be visiting my sisses in Indiana for a family reunion as you read it.

On our last visit, we went on a junking jaunt East from Pendleton on Highway 40.

We usually have a good junkin day every time I go to Indy. Sometimes just hitting Goodwills, other times antique malls, doesn't matter where we go or what we do, its always fun to be together.

Bobbie Sue and Sissy are both coming to Romantic Gothic Ghosts! So is Cousin Paula, Guncle Randy and two of my husband's sisters, Terry and Sandy. It will mean a lot to me for my family to meet some of my blog friends and see what I actually do for a job. If you can call it a job…

We often do crafty days too. This time, we'll be making centerpieces for our Downey Dinner, family reunion. My Daddy had 8 brothers and sisters, and every summer the remaining sibs and all the families gather for a big pitch in. Hosting responsibilities rotate down the line from the oldest orginal member to the youngest. This year is our Dad's turn, so it falls to my sisses and I to host in his place.

Normally, everyone shows up, sets out the food in the rented hall as is, that's it. But, since we get to plan it this year, we are making centerpieces and using table cloths. Nothing elaborate, just something to brighten the room up.

I have red and white, throw away table cloths, to keep things simple for clean up. And we are making family trees as centerpieces. They will involve a branch in a canning jar, with photos from last year's reunion and some old pictures from decades ago tied to the branches.

The photos will be cut with decorative punches, glued to colorful scrapbook paper, and tied up with twine. I'll toss a doiley or two under each canning jar to make it even homier.

This will be our crafty day project with the family a couple days before the reunion. I'm filling a box with supplies and we'll all make a few hanging pictures for the trees. I think it would be nice if relatives could pluck pictures they like from the centerpieces to keep as momentos. Some might even be cute Xmas tree ornaments for the holidays in the right homes.

When I get back, I'll be finishing up some other projects then its time to go into full Faerie Book Swap mode. (this page is my sister-in-law Sandy's.)

People are still joining! And since I made plenty of extra covers, there is room. If you think you can have the pages to me by Sept. 1, feel free to enter. Isn't it nice to be a part of an easy going, do what you want, type swap?

I hope the swappers all enjoy it as much as I do! oooh, I can't wait to get home and see the piles of pages that come while I am away!

Happy birthday Sugarwings!

celebrations, Dew Drop, dogs, Dorkies (Yorkshire Terrriers), fairies, family, Mayara, puppies!, Sugarwings, yorkies

By Karla Nathan / August 24, 2012

Sugarwings' birthday was such a fun day for us. We went to lunch at T. Rex to see the dinosaurs, but at first, Dewdrop wasn't sure if we should go in. Once she realized that there were cute little baby dinosaurs there, she was fine.( I don't know why the restaurant keeps the biggest, scariest one of all right inside the door to greet everyone. I guess they want to test the kids right up front to see if they can withstand the atmosphere before they waste table space incase the little ones have to leave before the food comes? If the kids can get past the giant monster at the door, they must be brave enough to sit and eat there.)

Sugarwings has always loved it there. Dewdrop took some convincing, but not much, She was careful to not look at the bigger ones, but was happy to give hugs and kisses to the colorful, cartoony beasts.

We walked around the shopping center, and let the kids run around on the Yellow Brick Road sidewalks. It was a favorite pastime for Sugarwings when she was little. Now that she is turning 6, I wanted to take her there again before she was too big to enjoy it.

Hopefully, she'll never be too old to be silly with Grams.

And honestly, she is happy anywhere she goes. Her idea of fun is just exploring. It can be along a yellow sidewalk that takes her imagination to Oz. or just sitting in the grass meeting whatever bug crawls by. It all entertains her.

Dewdrop had a good time on our day out too. And I was pleased to spend time with my boy, remembering when he was a little guy and running way ahead of me wherever we went, just like his daughter does now.

A pretty table cloth, a pitcher of Chocolate milk so that the kiddos could pour their own refills, and letting the baby join the big kids table all made a special meal for the birthday girl that night for dinner.

We also covered a big chair and tied balloons to it, creating a birthday throne when cake and ice cream time came. Then, her cupcake was served on a musical, wind up cake plate that plays "Happy Birthday", but not very good. Its kind of old and wonky, but still a fun tradition for us.

It was all I could do, to not be teary all day. I can't believe she is six now.

The last few years have zoomed by!

To enter the giveaway, please leave a comment HERE.

Sweet little chicks and cactus flowers

family, Hens, Sugarwings

By Karla Nathan / July 23, 2012

Ever have one of those days when lots of bad or stressful things happen, but you still feel like you had a good day?

Lets see, today I woke up with a sore back and realized that the bed frame had broken and I was sleeping downhill (time to lose some vacation pounds?), then had to go on a opossum hunt through the wild, over grown flower beds in my jammies and high heels (they were the quickest shoes I could grab, since they were still on top of my suitcase from the party and I had to get the critter before it got my chickens!). The beast didn't get a bird, and I lost its trail, but searched high and low, trying to find where it scurried off to. By the way, I was wearing a vintage cotton night gown, the best of bed head styles, and carrying a big pink shovel. That opossum was right to run, I looked crazy.

The dogs did nab a hen later today, but didn't harm her, just her feathers. It was quite traumatic. And its over 100 degrees again today.

Ryan's car broke down, twice. Once, it was out of gas, the second time the battery ran down. Sugarwings and I missed a movie we were headed to when we had to help him instead. He pushed his car to work for blocks uphill, in this heat. We drove off thinking all was well, and it wasn't, I don't know why he didn't call us back!

There was a disagreement with a family member and I'm not one to loose my temper, I'm more of a cheek turner. But today I blew. Not proud of that one.

We made a loaf of bread and the paddle didn't turn, so I had baked flour with wet crusty edges. Not a big deal, but just one more thing today. And did I mention that it was 107 degrees again? The heat is unbearable.

But there was a bloom on our cactus, a gift from a grand child and sits in a pot painted by one of the little fairies.

It kind of stands for the day I've had, lots of problems and cactussy moments, but some how the day bloomed anyway. Having a happy little Sugarwings by my side all day kept me from feeling bad about all the issues that could have gotten me down.

She's my sunny, little cactus flower. Its impossible to have a bad day when I'm with her.

Instead, I enjoyed the good parts of the day. Here are the good points of the day that outweighed the bad ones:

Watching Sugarwings pretend to be in a parade through the grocery store whille holding 2 dozen pink roses on sale for $5.

Dewdrop running into my arms and showing me that she could do all of the motions to Itsy Bitsy Spider.

Seeing Ryan handle his car problems with a good attitude and being proud of the man he grew up to be. He has lots of LD issues and was a very short tempered, frustrated child. He is a fine man now and I'm proud of him.

Picking a bag of fresh veggies from the garden, and popping a sun warmed tomato in my mouth

Watching the hens play in the sprinkler to beat the heat.

Taking a meal to a friend who hasn't been feeling well. I wish I saw her more often and I really should try to help more, I'm glad I made time today.

Laughing with my sister-in-law, Sandy who is living with us. Its good to have a freind around to share a silly thought with now and then. I also appreciated having her here to listen to me grumble about all the problems today and to accompany me on the oppossum hunt.

Getting a funny text from my husband who is quite proud of breaking a bed after being married 30 years.

Feeling Twinkle's puppies move for the first time. I love to try to count the bumps in her belly to guess how many will be born.

Seeing how sweet Sugarwings was about missing her movie. She is not a grumbler when things don't go her way. That made me want to not grumble about my peeves either.

Baking a second loaf of bread that turned out crustily wonderful on the outside and soft and almondy on the inside- just in time to have for dinner. As a matter of fact, a slice of that would make a nice bedtime snack too. Except I have no bed, I'll be sleeping on the couch till we get that bed frame repaired.

Oh, and I have a Project Runway recorded and ready to watch, that is the icing on the cake to top off this day.

Happiest of 80th birthdays to Little Joan

celebrations, family

By Karla Nathan / July 22, 2012

Little Joan's birthday was a heck of a bash. Our Utah relatives are wonderful hosts and threw a lovely party for her special day.

The entrance to the hall featured a floral swag with this welcoming sign.

And there were albums filled with old family photos to flip through. I always love vintage pictures, but when they are of relatives, it really does make them more special. I should copy and use some for my work, just to help my husband's confusion. Because every time I use make something with an old image in it, he looks perplexed and says, "who is that? Do we know them?"

Imagine how relieved he would be if I told him, that yes, we knew the people in the art!

Here is Joan with her sisters. She is the itsy bitsy one on the end.

She is still a little bitty lady.

With a lot of fun packed into that tiny little package!

A feathered guest at a fancy wedding

Dew Drop, family, Hens, Sugarwings

By Karla Nathan / July 17, 2012

Thanks for all of your visits during the studio tour, I know I've shown the room dozens of times before, so I wondered if anyone would even care to see it again. I tried to post photos of different parts of the room than in the past, but some of it was a bit repetitive.

Sugarwings was with me almost every day last week, and luckily we had a break in the weather and were able to enjoy the outdoors for a change. Although, I'm not sure if the cooler air was really cool enough for gloves….

We like to sit in the garden, under an archway covered in vines. In the past, I used to trim them, but now, we let them grow wild and crazy, so that we have an enclosed area to play in. Its shady and cozy. When we sit under the low hanging branches, we feel like we are hidden away in a world of our own. Its a good spot for picnics, hiding from ogres, and for weddings.

We had a special guest at this garden wedding. One of our cuddly, Rhode Island Reds decided to join us in the arbor clubhouse.

These sweet, little hens are becoming part of the family. Its so fun to have them follow us around the yard, curious about what we might be doing in case it involves crumbs of any kind.

Of course, ask me about mid- January when I have to slosh through drifts of snow to go take care of the birds a couple times a day, if I still love them as much.

The chickens are NOT doing their job of eating enough of the bugs. So far, they've been great with grasshoppers in the flower beds, and we've not had to use any pesticides at all in our veggie garden. But they haven't eaten a single chigger from the yard. We are all suffering from chigger attacks, and Sugarwings and I have tried to play only on the paved or gravel areas to avoid getting chewed up.

We are hoping to buy some Guinea fowl, they are champion chigger eaters, but we can't find any full grown hens around to buy.

Every time I wake up at 3am scratching, I swear I'd pay a fortune to own a couple chigger eating birds. Anyone know where I can find some?

We don't like the idea of spritzing the little fairy grand babies with bug spray at all. Especially since I coat my ankles with it and still get bitten.

But this year is the worst I've ever seen for pests. I suspected it would be when we had such a glorious, mild winter. As much as I hate snow and cold, it serves a purpose, and does help keep the bugs down.

So, I'll try to remember that when I feel like complaining about going out to take care of hens in the cold this winter. It probably won't shut me up, though, I most likely will still grumble about the cold.

Yummy Bread Machine bread – too, too good

Dew Drop, fairies, family, Food and Drink, Hens, paintings

By Karla Nathan / June 29, 2012

This week has been a hodge podge. I repainted a fairy, finished another, signed up a TON of people for the swap (yay! This will be a fun one!), babysat my own little fairies, and baked a TON of bread. I might just weigh a TON more now that I've experimented with my new bread machine a bit…

As the smell of fresh baked bread fills the house, my Sister-In-Law, Sandy, and I do all we can to stop ourselves from standing over it, each clutching a stick of butter in our greedy little paws.

You know you've baked too much, when you realize the 5 lb bag of flour is empty.

I'm not a measuring type, but I've tried to approximate measures, so that the machine will be filled with the right amounts, and not overflow. And I've learned that as much as I love the pure whole wheat flour, it can be a bit heavy for most people. I've switched to mostly whole wheat, and about a 1/3 bread flour. Its lighter and breadier.

Pure whole wheat does make a good, solid, filling peasant type bread though.

Here is my favorite made up recipe (sort of- my own measurements are eyeballed)

Yummy Bread (as Sugarwings calls it)

1-1/2 cup leftover coffee, still warm, not hot (I drink Starbucks Vanilla)

1/2 cup organic clover honey

3/4 cup dried mixed berries

1/2 cup roasted pumpkin seeds

1/2 cup roasted sunflower seeds

2 cups whole wheat flour (organic)

1 cup unbleached organic bread flour

2-1/4 tsp bread machine yeast

Dump into machine in that order. From what I hear, you want the liquid on the bottom and the yeast on the top. I don't know why.

Bake on the whole wheat setting.

Stand by with your stick of butter so you are ready when the bread is done! (notice that I didn't add oil or butter to the mix? I forgot to, and liked it better this way, it was moist and soft, and I put enough butter on top while its hot, that I do not need any inside the loaf too)

Bread machines are too, too easy to use. It takes me less than five minutes to make a loaf of deliciousness. If I keep this up, I will become housebound, too big to fit through the front door.

On Thursday, it got up to 107 degrees. In June. Yes, 107. Dang!

I had both little girls here, and we really did try to play outside. We turned on the hose, made mud pies and stayed in the shade till almost noon. I was proud of myself for staying out that long. As soon as lunch time came, I had the perfect excuse to give up on the great outdoors and get into the air conditioning.

Then, we did the same thing we do on blizzardy days. We built a fort of blankets over the dining room table, filled the floor with pillows and climbed in to watch movies and read books. We also brought markers, and drew all over the under belly of the table. Sugawings traced her foot and I dated it.

It was too hot for the chickens today too, when I turned on the hose to water the flower beds, a couple of them dove in to cool off in the water.

There hasn't been a lot of time for making things other than bread this week. I did finish a few book covers for the swap, I need to keep on top of that and make a few here and there, so I'm not swamped with too many at the last moment. We are at about 60 or so right now.

I hope you'll join us if you haven't yet.

Believe it or not, I actually made time to list some millinery packs in the Boutique!

Including some Halloween/Autumn tones.

And one magnificent double white rose with white velvet ribbons!

Kick starting the summer fun season

Dew Drop, family, Sugarwings

By Karla Nathan / June 2, 2012

Sugarwings is now a proud graduate of Pre K.

She was so excited to get her diploma that she flew through the air to show it to her mommy.

The celebration was at the playground of her school, and Dewdrop enjoyed playing on the big kid's toys. Her Daddy liked it too.

There were carnival games, cotton candy, and lots of laughs.

We've been having plenty of fun lately, we made a trip to the KC Zoo too.

Personally, its not my favorite zoo. The Topeka one is ideal for small kids, and the Omaha fantasy world zoo is amazingly fun and entertaining with what feels like adventures, not cages.

But the one in KC offers lots of things to ride.

We bought the arm bands that give everyone unlimited access to the merry-go-round, boat, sky chair, train, and tram. But the place is so big that we didn't get to ride all of them even once, let alone over and over.

Mostly, the two little grand fairies wanted to be carried everywhere. Their pal, Sara, was their favorite ride. She was happy to have one or the other little girl in her arms all day.

Daddy did his share of carrying them too.

Doesn't my son look handsome with his newly shaven face? Its been so long since I'd seen him without a beard, I'd forgotten what he looked like freshly "mowed" as Sugarwings called it.

The monkeys were extra friendly and would put their hands up to the glass like they wanted to touch the humans visiting them.

It looks like its going to be a wonderful summer! My favorite time of year.

Nests and fairies and birdies and peeps

bird song art event, Dew Drop, fairies, family, free images, Sugarwings

By Karla Nathan / May 26, 2012

While I was in CA, I celebrated my 54th birthday, and it was a joy to be with friends that day. A group of them took me out to lunch the day before, and Carol treated me to dinner that night.

My roomie, Lori, even brought me a sweet little gift in bed when I woke up on my birthday. Now, that is special treatment!!

Lori has some photos in Jenny Doh's new book, and one of them is of me! Well, part of me, at least.

As a thank you to my freinds for making my birthday so nice, I made up some wire nests (from my Twining and Twirling online workshop).

These are all on their way to my thoughtful buddies now. Just a token to thank them for the great weekend.

(I've added a few nests to my Boutique also)

While we are talking nests, I thought I'd show you my banner from the Birdsong swap I joined. I wish I could have been a part of all of them, but I was a little overwhelmed at the time. There were some really great swaps, I was impressed. And so glad that I was in this one! I usually try to join one swap whenever I go to an arty event, because I spend so much time oohing and ah-hing when I watch the trades getting opened and end up jealous over the beautiful loot everyone gets.

These letters were temporarily clipped to my curtain rod in the kitchen, but I kind of like them there, and they might hang out that way for a while.

This book is a Birdsong treat that I got from my friend, Tami.

Its more than perfect, because when I send messages to the Birdsong group, I call them my "peeps". Plus, I kind of like fairies a bit…

Its an adorable book, that Sugarwings and I fell in love with right away. Cute illustrations,and a fun little story filled with songs and poems and lots of fairies.

She has been entranced by it, and after I read it to her, she sat and looked at the book for over an hour.

And this is a kid that doesn't sit still much.

The peeps who came to Birdsong were overly generous! Very thoughtful gifts came our way, what a wonderful bonus on top of the great weekend of fun that I had with all the ladies.

I'll leave you with a scan of one of my favorite pages, and of the cover. Click to open in a larger size before you save them to your computer to print.

Thoughts on blogging

family, Sugarwings, Travel

By Karla Nathan / May 23, 2012

Lately, its been really hard for me to get back in the swing of things. I'm so out of my normal routine that I can't seem to find my way back into it.

Its been a LONG time since I've taken care of my Boutique, and that poor little neglected Etsy shop… the poor thing, it is just going to whither up and die if I don't add something soon.

For the whole month of April, I was working on getting things set up for Birdsong, then had the event itself and my double the fun vacation at Tiffany's then onto Disney with the grand fairy.

Since that, I've limped back into production slowly, and not so surely. My days have been more catch up than getting ahead. I'm happy to say that I finally made something new, at a fun craft day with Beth a few days ago, and I actually listed some supplies in the Boutique.

These are new buckles that I oxidized to create a vintage looking patina on.

I've done the same with some pink rhinestone chain.

And some aurora borealis chain too. Its not much, I really need to get photos of the piles of stuff waiting to be sold posted onto the site.

But honestly, I've been just puttering my way through the weeks, not getting a lot done. Mostly goofing off stuff, like I think I'm still on vacation. We've gone to the zoo, had tea parties, I've done yard work, edited trip pictures, messed around with rearranging the studio, wrote in my blog, visited friends, sat in the yard and watched the new chickens, just fun little things.

My blog is supposedly "work" for me. Its how I sell things. But, if I don't have things to sell, its not really working, its just hanging out!

Which brings me to this- my buddy, Carol, gave a talk at Tiffanys. She spoke about blogging, business, and related topics.

Here are some things that came up in the interesting discussion with the crowd. Is blogging dead? Do people even read them any more?

If you blog, should it be all business? Some thought posts should be direct and short, and stick to a subject. That people only cared about photos, or only about Pinterest, not blogs. But where do you get the photos for Pinterest if there are no blogs, I wonder?

Others said they hate blogs that try to push shopping on you. That they feel used if a blog is just used for self promotion.

The way I see it, if I don't use my blog to sell some stuff here and there, I have no excuse to keep one and will have to get a (god forbid) REAL job (gasp!).

Even though I show photos of whats new in the shop (when I get off my behind and add something to the shop, that is), I try not to cram it down the reader's throat. And its hard for me to stick to just business, although I think my family would prefer that I did. Or to keep it short and simple.

What do you look for in a blog?

Do you think blogs are on their way out?

How do you read them, if you do- Facebook, Googlereader?

Dew Drop, fairies, family, games, Sugarwings

By Karla Nathan / April 23, 2012

I had some much needed Sugarwings time over the weekend, and as always, she brought lots of smiles to our house.

She helped me with some sugar cookies, although she doesn't realize that her batch never made it into the main pile of goodies. I wouldn't call myself a germ-a-phobe, (then again, some people do think that), but I'm always really careful about stuff kids bake. I separate the dough, give her some of her own to work with and do whatever disgustingly fun stuff she can think of to do to it.

I think our littlest fairy will be enjoy baking with us too. Dewdrop got out of the tub the other day, saw me making cookies, and ran naked as fast as she could to her play kitchen to get a spoon, and zoomed to me demanding to help!

Sugarwings and I also played dress up with the wedding gowns I found in a closet and got out to sell at Birdsong.

(bad photo, sorry)

The train was her favorite part of the gown.

She also helped me with my latest obsession, Drawsomething.

She likes to add the finishing touches to my pictures.

On Saturday, I took a break from working on Birdsong set up, and spent the entire day with my handsome husband.

We cleaned our old, beat up pontoon boat and got it ready for the lake. On the way there, we tried to save a few bucks by filling the tank at the gas station instead of paying Marina prices.

He wasn't quite sure it was worth the effort, but did it for me. I'm the cheapskate in the family. But hey, that extra dollar a gallon adds up!

We also ran errands around town, went out for a sushi dinner and saw Hunger Games (my second time, and I'd be happy to see it a third time)

Beautiful weather, accomplishments made, great company, good food, and a handsome man by my side. Not a bad weekend.

He's a pretty hot grandfather, huh?

There was even time to play a few more games of Drawsomething.

Not as many as I would like, though.

If I didn't have Birdsong to get ready for, I think I'd be playing this game way, way too much!

By the time I'm set up for Birdsong, I hope I still have energy left to play, but I have a feeling I'll be doing more of this!!