A Little Baby Face

It's Monday, the day of all things BLUE! Our hostess for this fun day is Smiling Sally, and she has a list of all those showing off their blueness, as well as the guidelines if you'd like to join us!This week I am sharing a charcoal sketch of a baby's head. It appears to be floating. The paper is a very cool blue and the mat is a darker blue. Can you guess who this absolutely adorable possible Gerber baby is?
If you look closely you'll notice my reflection in the glass, as well as the circular artwork on the wall behind me.
I hope everyone has a super week!

Pressed Glass

It's Pinkday, AKA Pink Saturday, hosted by Beverly at How Sweet the Sound. Beverly has asked us to visit a new-to-us participant and showcase them in our post the following week. Last week I visited Just a Little Zizzy. The name caught my eye, and then when I visited she had some gorgeous flower photos. Please take the time to visit and comment at both Beverly's and Zizzybob's blogs.
This is one of my pink Depression Glass platters. It is pretty small, about the size of a regular dinner plate, but it is considered a platter because of the handles. If you enlarge the picture you'll see that the handles are not hollowed out, just thinner glass pressed by the mold, which I think is interesting.I have a lot of Depression Glass, some of which I don't really care about, but this one is special to me because it was my bridesmaid gift from my sister. She and her hubby enjoy wandering antique stores, although they don't buy much for themselves, and happened across this. She thought it was a nice idea to give me something original along with the jewelry all the girls were receiving, and I totally agree!

You Asked For It!

On Monday I mentioned that I spent last weekend making Christmas earrings, and many of you asked to see them. So, for today's Finished For Friday @ Lit & Laundry here they are, along with a few other pairs. These are my first attempts at earrings; I am just learning to use the pliers and crimpers. One thing I like about all of these earrings is that they are small enough for young girls, and elegant enough for adults. I will be putting these into my etsy shop, Little Somethings, on Monday. Until then I will sell them to my bloggy friends for $5.00 a pair and no shipping.These sweet little angels have frosted wings and head, and a sparkly bead for the dress. The one shown here is a very pale pink, and I also made them in clear crystal and cobalt blue. She has a silver halo and a silver belt.This angel is specifically Christmas, with red and green beads stacked in graduating sizes, and the same silver halo as the first angel. The wings are silvertone metal.My niece fell in love with these little trees. They are sparkly green beads stacked by size, with a golden amber bead for the star and a tiny red cube for the base.
For Book Blogger Appreciation Week I am donating a pair of earrings, a bracelet, and either some ornaments I am making, or a banner, depending on what I get done. There will be all sorts of prizes that week at the BBAW blog.

Margarita, Anyone?

Summer is the time for blender drinks, right? Pina Coladas, Margaritas, Daquiris, and of course all kinds of smoothies, refreshing and sweet! I am a fan of raspberry margaritas, loving the sweet and tart mix. Or try a frozen lemonade with iced tea. Scrumptious! For Vintage Thingies Thursday this week, I have the perfect summer appliance, a blender.

This was given to my mom as a wedding shower gift in 1963, and it is the blender she still uses to this day. It weighs a ton, and only has 3 speeds, but the pitcher is super-thick glass and the blades are ultra-sharp metal. I checked out the Waring web site and they still make almost the exact model, marketing it to professional bars. It costs $130.00; I wonder what it cost in 1963. Whatever it was, my parents have sure gotten somebody's money worth out of it!

So, how old is your oldest appliance? And what is your favorite blender drink?
Vintage Thingies Thursday is hosted by Suzanne @ Colorado Lady. She has some adorable bears to show off this week!

A Separate Country

In high school I was a huge Civil War buff, reading both fiction and non-fiction and seeing any films I could get my hands on. I knew about the various generals on each side, most of whom had attended West Point together as youths, and served in the US Army together before the secession. I read little information about what the defeated generals did after the war. Did the US Army take them back? Did they emigrate, leaving the land of their birth to start fresh somewhere else?

A Separate Country by Robert Hicks is a fictional story of Confederate General John Bell Hood's life after the War between the States. With an injured hand, and missing one leg, he moves to New Orleans from his native Tennessee and marries Anna Maria Hennen, with whom he has eleven children, including three sets of twins! The story is told through the eyes of Anna Maria, Hood, and Eli Griffin, a man who comes to New Orleans to kill Hood, blaming him for the destruction of his family and farm during the war.
The facts of Hood's life are accurate, and that alone would be a good story, but Mr. Hicks has given readers a real "what if" adventure, with Hood seeking personal redemption by working with yellow fever victims, and deciding to re-write his memoirs that he has already sent for publication. Instead of the grand glory of Army life, he decides to write about the blood, sweat, and regrets of his life, and that is what we are reading in this story.
I found A Separate Country interesting in the style of writing, as well as the depth of the characters, and the excitement of the different mysterious adventures with quirky secondary characters. The video below features pictures of the Hood family and is narrated by author Robert Hicks. It gives great insight into his love for his topic.
As part of the Book Blogger Appreciation Week Celebration of Books, Hachette has generously offered me three copies of this new release for my readers. We'll go with all the standards ways to enter, be sure to leave a separate comment for each different thing.

1. Leave a comment on this post stating that you'd like to win the book. Be sure that there is a valid email address attached to your profile or in your comment so I can contact you when you win. For the other 3 chances, if you already do them, still leave a separate comment so the random number generator gives you all your chances.
2. Become a Follower of the Evil Overlord,
3. Follow me on Twitter and/or Tweet about the giveaway (2 separate entries),
4. Become a Fan of my Facebook Page and/or share the giveaway on your wall (2 separate entries),
5. Let me know you are participating in BBAW also, with a link to one of your posts.

The 3 winners will be selected on Sunday, September 20, and notified via email.

Oh, My Gravy!

I hope everyone had a great weekend; it was very hot and humid here in the Boston area, with horrible air quality, so I stayed inside and watched a lot of movies and did some crafts. Believe it or not, I made earrings for Christmas! Thinking of Christmas and Thanksgiving makes me think of all the awesome foods that I only eat on those occasions, one of which is gravy.My dad is a big gravy guy, he pours it over everything on his plate, which totally grosses me out. I like a little gravy on my turkey, and that's about it.For my blue today, I have the gravy boat which is always on my mom's table for holidays. It has a beautiful blue trim and great details inside as well.I have always liked this gravy boat, and hope to get my hands on it some day, even though I'm not a gravy eater! I love it's symmetry and it would look great in my house because I like using blue accents.
Are there any foods you only eat at certain times, like holidays?
Be sure to enjoy more blues when you visit Smiling Sally, our Blue Monday hostess. Have a great week!

Wrapping Up Packages & the Week

I don't usually write a wrap-up of my week, but I did a lot these past 7 days, especially for someone who only left the house twice all week!

One of the times I left the house was to hit the post office. I had 8 packages to mail, 7 books, and 1 bracelet. These were all for winners of my recent giveaways.

Barbara, the Purple Goat Lady won the hot pink hemp bracelet that was available only to Pink Saturday participants.

Books went out to 7 bloggers who are going to review the books and offer giveaways for them during Book Blogger Appreciation Week, September 12-16. If you entered to win one of these and didn't, visit the winner and try again!
Get Real went to Wendy @ It's Only a Purple World
Mark from Thoughts of a Soujourner won Try Fear
The Way Home was won by Amy from The House of the Seven Tails
Justine from the Froggy Bloggy will be reading I'm So Happy For You
Rachel, The Obsessive Reader and a new book blogger, won Hollywood is like High School with Money
Mrs. B. Silly, aka Bridget won Ms. Taken Identity
and Easy on the Eyes was sent to Rachel who is In Need of Mercy.
I am also very excited that I have been nominated in 4 categories for Book Blogger Appreciation Week. Voting on the awards will not open until September 7, and by then I will probably only be in 2 categories due to the selection process. It's an honor to be nominated, as they say, and I thank those of you who suggested me to Amy and the others at BBAW. The categories are: Most Eclectic Taste, Best Writing, Best Reviews, and the one I really want, Best Blog Name.
If you have not yet posted the button for BBAW, it would be great if you could promote it, even if you aren't a big book blogger yourself. If you've won one of my book giveaways, it's a great way to remind people to come back and read your review that week.

Get the Scoop!

Happy Saturday, the day we celebrate the color pink in our world! Beverly has challenged us to visit one blog that is new to us each week, and then link to them in our following Pink Saturday post. That's a great idea to build up new readers. I encourage anyone reading this post to go visit Mary's Meanderings. She seems like a lovely lady who takes awesome photos and makes her own laundry detergent. And it's PINK!
Here's my offering for the week. I hope visitors will comment so I'll know you were here! I've shown you my mom's pink nightshirt from Maine, and the gorgeous topiaries made of pink flowers that we saw there, and now here's my favorite pink thing in Wells, ME: The Scoop Deck!They have a kagillion flavors of ice cream displayed on their mostly pink sign in the parking lot, my favorites being butter crunch and black bear.Here's my mom in her pink Quacker Factory ensemble given to her by one of her fabulous daughters (My sister never shops on QVC.) holding the bag with all of the cups to bring back to the hotel. Besides the giant pink ice cream cone, you can see the happy face pink OPEN sign if you enlarge the picture.
Be sure to visit our hostess, Beverly @ How Sweet the Sound and leave her a comment!
What's your favorite ice cream?

School Hasn't Even Started!

School doesn't start around here until September 2, and I am already preparing for Halloween! Not because I am a Halloween nut, but I'm getting ready for my first craft fair in mid-September.Here are some of the bracelets I've been making. I'd love pricing suggestions when you leave a comment!I did different styles and colors of hemp and varied the combinations of yellow and orange, some sparkly, some ceramic. I'm calling them candy corn bracelets. I'm also making some stretchy bracelets and a few with memory wire that I haven't taken pictures of yet. This one has hand-made glass pumpkins. It's very shiny, but only the green beads are cut to sparkle.Although there are no theme beads here, it's Halloween-y to me because of the colors I used. The clear beads are what is called "lampwork" with the glass being decorated over a lamp or flame. Using thin sticks of colored glass, the artist decorates the beads so they are more textural. These have black knobbies.
For more finished projects, visit Three Under Two @ Lit & Laundry!

My First Caper!

Welcome, Welcome, Welcome to Vintage Thingies Thursday, my favorite day of the week! I love visiting Suzanne at Colorado Lady and seeing what she and the other participants have to share this week. Flea market finds, junk store mystery boxes, things from attics and basements, it's amazing what cool things we all have if we just start looking. My offering for this week is from February of 1975, making it 34 years old, just barely vintage to some of us.

When I was in third grade our family made our first trip to Walt Disney World in Orlando, FL. We had a great time, and did all there was to do at the time, which was basically just the Magic Kingdom. Our favorite evening was the Hoop de Doo Review at Fort Wilderness, and our favorite place to eat in the Magic Kingdom was the Crystal Palace, just off of Maine Street USA. At that time, all of the dishes in the restaurants had the Disney World logo on them. In the gift shops there were other Disney-themed mugs, glasses, and such, but not the same ones that were used in the restaurants.My dad really liked the restaurant dishes, and asked to buy a mug. He even spoke with the restaurant manager, and the hotel manager at the Contemporary Resort. Nope, not for sale. My dad grumbled about this all week, and whenever we went by a gift shop he went in to see if they had the dishes, even though he'd been told they weren't available. On our last morning of vacation we had breakfast at the Crystal Palace after doing our last minute gift shop run. We had bags all around our table. Good old sneaky me, still just 8 years old, grabbed my empty hot chocolate mug, shoved a napkin in so it wouldn't drip, and put it in one of the bags! My dad is so proud of that mug to this day, and displays it proudly on the shelves of the family room, loving to tell people the story of the mug. It also started me on a life of crime, stealing souvenir type glasses whenever they were available. Yes, I am one of the reasons that many places no longer have their logo on glasses, mugs, or ashtrays. Well, no one has ashtrays anymore, except me! LOL
I hope I have not horrified anyone with my tale of juvenile delinquency. I still take things from restaurants, but nothing permanent, just sweetener and orange marmalades!
Be sure to stop by and check out the dishes Suzanne is showing off this week. Silly her, she actually paid for them!
Do you take sweeteners, or extra shampoos from hotels?

Doin' the Bird!

I was driving home from the doctor today, listening to one of those mix stations that claim they play everything, and it was like a walk through the 80s for about 5 songs in a row, all of which were and still are favorites of mine.
Remember Morris Day and the Time? Proteges of Prince, they opened for his Purple Rain tour, which I was privileged to see in 1984. When I heard it I was transported back to the Hartford Civic Center, the smell of cigarettes, beer, and sweat, remembering climbing up to our seats, which were pretty good, but I still hate going up and down those steps, and feeling my carefully applied jazzy makeup melting down my face. I still have the big hot pink and turquoise plastic earrings I wore to the show!
The song on the radio was Jungle Love, and my other favorite was The Bird, with that weirdo dance that kind of makes me think of Shake Ya Tailfeather by Murphy Lee, Nelly, and P. Diddy. Here's a little clip of The Bird.
Then came a big favorite of all 80s folks, Footloose. Check out Kevin Bacon, he's barely aged!

Footloose makes me think of a warm June day in 1984. It was Senior Skip Day, but for some reason some of us Juniors also skipped. We were at the Barkhamsted Reservoir laying around getting tan and playing loud music, which is what you did in high school, right? I can feel the wind as I was driving the Silver Streak, my 1978 Mercury Monarch, and my friends and I were playing the Footloose soundtrack and singing at the top of my lungs.
Any songs that bring back all of the sensations of a time and place for you?

I Have a Chicken, Too!

For Vintage Thingies Thursday last week, I shared my one and only tea cup. I had felt left out of the bloggy tea cup club and was excited to find out I was a member. Well, there's another club that I didn't belong to...the chicken club! (No, not the sandwich!) Many of you have big rooster or chicken collections. Dish towels, plates, statuary, you've got them everywhere. Sadly, I have been left out of this poultry club. UNTIL NOW! I'd like to unveil my small chicken casserole dish, which is blue, of course, for Blue Monday.Dishes like these can be baked in the oven to make individual chicken pot pies. Mine just sits on the hutch with other nifty things from, you guessed it, my dad's basement. This was my great-aunt Gertie's, and I remember it being in the pantry of her big old Victorian house. It had the original pantry with a window and a counter for actually doing work in there.
For more great blue things, visit Smiling Sally, our Blue Monday hostess, and think about joining us next week!

Pink & Crafty Giveaway

What a busy week I've had! Things are picking up at my etsy shop Little Somethings, and I am working on a lot of autumn and Christmas items. At the bottom of this post is information on 2 giveaways and a discount opportunity.I also fulfilled my first custom note card order, and thought I'd show you a few of them.
The woman's name is Julie, and she told me to do whatever I wanted.That gave me a chance to play with different fonts and see how they looked cut out, as well as use various odds and ends I had laying around, without digging in to all new materials.Since I am all revved up and excited, I'm going to offer a 2-day giveaway to Pink Saturday participants ONLY. Just leave a comment telling me you'd like to win AND leave a comment for Beverly at How Sweet the Sound, thanking her for hosting us. The winner will receive this snazzy pink cord bracelet with tropical colored beads, a great piece of summer jewelry.I will do the drawing and announce the winner on Tuesday, along with the 8 winners of the Enormous Book Giveaway!

For the Pink Saturday participants who don't win the bracelet, I am offering a 10% discount on any purchase from Little Somethings, good through Monday, midnight, EST. Just put the words Pink Saturday in the message box when you complete the sale.
Have a great weekend, and be sure to visit Beverly and some of the other Pink Saturday participants over at How Sweet the Sound.

Getting Things Done

I've been pretty busy the last 2 weeks. Usually my days consist of watching TV, playing games on the computer, blogging, and napping. But I've had a burst of energy and motivation and I've done a lot of crafting. I signed up for my first craft fair in mid-September, so I'm hot to get things made to sell. Thought I'd share some of it with my bloggy friends. If anything interests you, let me know!
I finished my first order of custom notecards; here's one of them. I love the silver paper, but it doesn't show well on camera.I'm in love with this necklace! It was the last of my red hemp.I am calling these Inner Balance Beads. Each bead represents a different strength and helps the wearer remember to keep their inner self in balance.I am madly in love with this bracelet! My 2 favorite colors, purple and green, with awesome metal beads.
I hope to have many more things accomplished by next Friday. To see other people's finished projects for the week, visit Three Under Two @ Lit 'n Laundry!

Don't forget that my book giveaway ends Sunday night.

My First Teacup

Everyone in blog land seems to have tea cups except me. I was feeling very left out of your little club until I remembered this awesome cup that I've had since I was a little kid. I keep it displayed on my corner hutch, and see it so often that I'd forgotten it was there! It has a nice story behind it, too.When were were little, my sister and I would often have sleepovers with our Aunt Kakee, my dad's sister. Of course, being my DAD'S sister, she had and still has, tons of old things. She had a great collection of unusual tea cups. Some with tall bases, many with tons of gold trim, all hand painted, and all from pre-WWII Japan.We were allowed to choose a cup for breakfast and have very milky coffee, which we thought was awesome, of course. Eventually she let us each choose a cup to keep, and they became our coffee cups at home on weekends. I think these cups and the rituals and traditions around them are one of the reasons that breakfast is my favorite meal.Every Saturday my dad would make a yummy bacon and egg breakfast, and Sundays he made pancakes or waffles. He still does this for my mom to this day! We were one of those families that always had dinner together, but my best memories are of the breakfasts, discussing what we were going to do that weekend, what we had learned at school, and just yakking because there usually wasn't anywhere to rush off to.
Do you have certain objects that bring back big memories? Do your kids like to hear the stories? My niece and nephews do!
For more vintage goodies, visit Suzanne at Colorado Lady, our Vintage Thingies Thursday hostess.
REMEMBER: To check out my book giveaways!