AmeriCARna 2015

AmeriCARna passed through our town again today. About 600+ American cars or American themed cars such as hot rods drove into our town about 1.00 pm today to display their cars and take part in various events. I popped my head out of work briefly and saw a few of the first cars drive into the town centre. They stayed until close to 5.00 pm when they started heading off for their next venue. My daughter Jamie and I walked to the round-about down the road from us that exits onto the Highway and took turns at taking photos. I really enjoyed the quality time we shared taking photos together.

Here are just a few of those photos. Sorry to those who are not into cars. I have to admit I am not a car enthusiast but I enjoy watching the cars leaving amidst toots, oogahs, flags fluttering, people waving and the enthusiasm of the participants and the onlookers.

 

 

I've decided I'm rather fond of the good old Ford pick-up trucks.

This is a link to the AmeriCARna site:

http://www.americarna.com/About/

This is a link to the video on my blog that I put together after the 2014 AmeriCARna:

http://myrtlemanorminiatures.blogspot.com/2014/03/americarna-2014-part-2-video.html

I have a fairly busy weekend with a family event and Jamie has a dance session both Saturday and Sunday to learn a new competition dance but hopefully I might find a little time on Sunday to do some minis.

Have a good weekend everyone. Of course it is already late Friday night here in New Zealand whereas some of you are a day behind - your weekend is coming though. Enjoy it.

My Weekend

Woke up Saturday morning feeling a bit down with all the stresses we are facing at the moment. I've had to have a real think about my hobby with our current financial situation and have made the decision to sell a lot of my vintage miniatures. The good thing is I will now focus on making miniatures. Anyway, I picked up my laptop to check my emails, blogs etc and soon had a smile on my face. Look here to see why:

http://minifanaticus.blogspot.co.nz/2015/02/minifanaticus-hutchessssssss-giveaway.html

Yes, I am one of the lucky winners of a giveaway from Jane of Minifanaticus. The hutch she has made far exceeds the vision I had in my mind's eye when I put the idea in her blog comments section of her giveaway post. I will put some pictures on my blog when it arrives. I spent quite a bit of time after reading of my win looking at images on Pinterest planning out a little scene to house the hutch in. That will be my next little project.

Talking of projects I did do a bit more to the Upcycling Project as you can see below but my heart just isn't in that project at the moment so it will go on hold until I'm ready to carry on with it. It didn't help that after I had done all the grass area a box fell on it and took half the grass off and flattened some plants!

Sorry, I didn't realise what a bad photo this was until I loaded it. I have added some large plants at the back to give the effect of it being a little environment within a full sized garden, a cork with beer bottle top for a table and two golf tees for seats, some game counters for stepping stones and the frame of a pocket watch which will become a fish pond. I will get back to this when I have learnt a bit more about making flowers. My daughter won't let me away with not finishing this project as she loves it.

 

Talking of making flowers I had a lovely afternoon last Sunday with the only other miniaturist that I know of in my town. Susan and I decided to meet and have a go at making flowers. The truth is we mostly talked and used our punches to punch out flower parts. We didn't actually produce any flowers on the day. So saying it was a fabulous afternoon and we set ourselves a challenge to produce some flowers before we next meet.

 

Therefore today I thought I had better try and make some flowers. After a lot of failed attempts I did produce two delphiniums and one tiny rose that I was reasonably happy with. I then decided I'd better create something to put them in. While our challenge was to make a flower arrangement I chose to create a trug to place my flowers in.

 

 

 

I also produced a little jug which I filled with some little flowers I made a few weeks ago. I'm not very happy with either the jug or the flowers but there is potential in both with a bit more work.

 

 

Anyway I'd better go as it is way passed when I should have gone to bed but I was determined to get a blog post done this weekend. Busy with family commitments and Dance Mum commitments next weekend. Hopefully might find a little time next Sunday afternoon to do some minis.

 

Hope everyone has had a great weekend. Happy creating.

Christmas Swaps

I know it is February but it is only now that I can post photos of the gifts I sent my two Christmas Chain Swap partners. Fabiola and Drora. Unfortunately due to losing my Mum in early December and then with my husband's Dad having a major stroke two days later I was a bit late posting them. I posted them before Christmas but Fabiola has only just received hers a few days ago.

 

I did a post on the lovely swap gifts I received from Fabiola and Drora here:

http://myrtlemanorminiatures.blogspot.co.nz/2015/01/back-to-work-tomorrow.html

 

From Fabiola I received:

 



and from Drora I received:

 

Below are photos of the swap parcels I sent Fabiola and Drora:

for Fabiola

for Drora



Just looking at these photos I took it has become obvious to me that I failed to put a little glass jug in with Fabiola's gift. Sorry Faby, it was certainly my intention to do so. I somehow must have overlooked it in my rush to get the parcels posted.

 

Adding to the delay in getting the parcels posted was my rush to get the little paper chains finished. Each link of the chain is made with little pieces of quilling paper 1/8 inch x 3/4 inch. I think they look effective and I enjoyed making them but they are fiddly and time consuming to make.

 

The Christmas stockings and the teddy bear are buttons, the vase of flowers is a bead with some paper scrapbooking roses in it and the angel and fancy cake plate and cake tongs are made from jewellery findings.

 

This is a close up of a cake plate and angel so you can see better the findings I used:

 

I do prefer a solid bead for the head as in the ones I used for the swap gifts.

 

I enjoy playing around with beads and jewellery findings to see what I can come up with - enjoyable play time.

 

Thank you to Fabiola for organising the swap. It is always lovely to receive miniatures from fellow miniaturists from around the world.

Fantasy Upcycling and More

I spent a bit of time this weekend in my craft room. I had good company... the cats decided it was a bit wet outside today.

Dash has a new hiding place.

 

 

Squiggle likes to keep an eye on what I am doing.

 

You may recall amongst the lovely swap gifts I received from Drora this Christmas I got a little rubber boy - see below:

 

 



The upcycling residents of the briefcase have transformed him into a plant holder for their garden:

I also played around with some spare wood scraps and made a little hall mirror and shelf, shown here in the study of The Laurels:

Well that is it for today. Hope everyone is having a great weekend.