3 More Glittered Christmas Cards From Germany

Victorian images + glitter = beautiful Christmas cards.

Three more cards, made in Germany, available in our store.

For the Birds

Our bird embroidery makes an appearance on a poster for birds.  Remember this pattern from Geninne?

Rock On!

Look what was in my mailbox! A couple of weeks ago I won a gorgeous hand painted rock in Geninne's giveaway.  Isn't it adorable? He has the most charming look on his face.  Thank you, Geninne, I love him!

 I couldn't resist keeping the cloth and tie that the rock was bundled in.  And that's Geninne's card on the right, which now has a happy home on my refrigerator.  As for my new bird rock,  he has a proud place on my desk where I can enjoy him everyday :-)

From My Garden to Yours: Pelican & Flamingo Bird Templates

This flamingo keeps watch over an ornamental garlic and group of impatiens.

The weather has been so lovely lately and absolutely perfect for gardening. With blue skies and gentle breezes, I haven't been able to resist getting out there and know I'll be glad I did when the heat of summer arrives.

This guy belonged to my great-grandmother. She gave it to my mom and my mom let me have him.

Apart from my great-grandmother's garden gnome, my absolute favorite garden accessories are several vintage wooden flamingos on stakes and one lone pelican. Over the years they've weathered beautifully to where you can see the grain of the wood. Neat patches of moss have replaced old paint, and the flamingos have faded from their original pink color.

I love how the wood grain is exposed.

Just in case you need a flamingo or pelican of your own, I've included a template below for you to download. Just click for the larger version and drag it into your desktop. You can enlarge or reduce as needed.

This pelican came off his stake, but sits quite nicely at the base of a newly planted king palm.

If you want to put one on a stake, simply drill a hole near the bottom. Using needle nose pliers bend a thick wire through the hole and squeeze it tight. You can always use one of the stake legs from a tomato cage if you're hard pressed for a thick enough wire.

A close up of how the stake is attached.

Here's the template:

Saturday Embroidery Project

A few days ago Geninne blogged a free embroidery pattern: a line drawing of one of her darling birds. I couldn't resist transferring him to a vintage style cotton tea towel and getting to work.

I tried to choose colors to go with the side stripes without being too matchy-matchy.

You can find Geninne's pattern here on her blog. You can find the tea towel here.

Spring Cleaning

Our run of sunshine for the last few days has everyone in chipper spirits, including these two sparrows. We happened to be in the yard photographing something else but turned our attention to the bird bath when we heard quite a commotion of happy chirping and splashing.

Usually these little guys have a sixth sense and make a hasty retreat before the camera is even totally pointed in their direction. Today though it was all about the bath.