miscellany...

 Given my long absence, today will be a bit of a photo dump.  I noticed that my stats actually went up in the last week, so I'm assuming people were checking in on me, and that a failure to post would result in a search party appearing on my doorstep.

The reason for my disappearance (other than a very needy puppy); the tedium of painting our plaster moldings in the current entry room (future library).  Given that our moldings are quite simple, I was shocked at how impossibly long they took to paint.  The cove seems to have been gilded and wallpapered in its past lives, and currently sports a thick uneven coat of joint compound and white paint.  While I know it should have been fully scraped, I just didn't have it in me, especially given that there is a layer of drywall over the original plaster ceiling.  The drywall was extremely well done, and we'll most likely leave it alone until we're ready to do the final restoration of the room - rebuilding the lost built-ins and wallpapering.  I'm hopeful that the drywall is hiding original wallpaper or stenciling, and as long as I believe that, the drywall doesn't stand a chance of surviving us finishing this space.  For now, several coats of gold paint are in the cove, with a brick red picking out some of the bullnosed sections, and the ceiling has been painted a pale gloss gold.

The scaffolding remained a feature of the room longer than I care to admit as I figured out one unassailable truth - decorating a 10 1/2 foot Christmas tree becomes infinitely easier when one has jolly yellow scaffolding to do it from.

In other news, this is the most perfect tree that has ever been grown, and I don't know that we'll ever find it's equal...  Also, in just a couple of weeks our dear little Maugrim has doubled in size (now 30 pounds, and taller than I'd care to admit).  At this rate of exponential growth I fear for the future of the planet, as such growth must be some sort of Grey Goo scenario.

PRESENTS!!!!!!

And for the rest, let me present: Christmas decorations, part of a huge parlor set we recently obtained, the enormous framed antique photo of our house that we've been waiting to hang for almost 3 years, and the finished painted crown (and partially finished woodwork).

 

 

And while I had fully intended to take photos of our Hanukkah party (actually HAMukkah, because we just can't find it in ourselves to ever be normal), we had too much fun to bother with pictures.  Our lonely menorah is all that remains...

wreath making for zombies

Hello from beyond the grave...

We're still sick over here, wading through not yet unpacked suitcases, dirty dishes and an explosion of Christmas accouterments I have no desire to deal with. In a desperate bid for holiday cheer we did buy and mostly decorate our tree, but the Christmas spirit has been no match for the plague, or whatever evil germs we're incubating.

With all of our very unseasonable snow and ice it's looking doubtful that I'll get lights up this year (our porch roofs are a bit of an icy slip and slide at the moment), and after hours spent on Pinterest since I'm too sick to do much of anything else the stars collided and I decided I'd make something to make up for my lack of lights. Now granted only the mail-lady is likely to see them, but thanks to the wonders of the internet I can inflict my crafting upon you as well! So I present to you - glue guns gone wild....

To be perfectly honest, I didn't come up with this - the original image is here, but mine has a fox. So there!

I had thought this would be a fairly cheap project, and the expensive main ingredient, the moss, I had in spades, left over from making my wedding centerpieces 4 years ago. Getting rid of that trashbag full of moss *may* have been one of the reasons I decided to make these, and on that account it was a failure, as I still have enough to make about 100 more.

If you'd like to make these for yourself though, you'll need a lot of natural sheet moss (a few different types is best), a wreath form (I used the cheapest straw one I could find), floral wire, a glue gun, fake miniature trees, and woodland creatures of your choice. I ended up buying everything but the trees from Michaels using 40% coupons, but I had to go to Joann's for the the trees. For the moss, the cheapest way to get it may be online in bulk from a floral supply company (that's how I bought mine).

I wrapped the wreaths with the floral wire because they seemed to want to decompose in my hand, I made a hanging loop at the same time.

Then I glued the moss (mixing up the types) front and back, making sure not to cover up the hanging loop. This will use A LOT of glue, and will take hours longer than you think it will...

Then lean the wreath upright (loop at the top) against something, and play with the placement of whatever it is you want to live on it. I chose to paint my critters with a few coats of modeling paint so the wreath didn't end up looking too much like a middle-schooler's diorama. When you know where you want to glue them on push away some of the moss and apply a big dollop of glue, place the object and hold in place for at least a minute before moving on to the next one.

I had intended to wrap some grape vines around the wreaths and make a bow out of some old upholstery webbing I have, but laziness prevailed. Maybe next year if they survive this weather...

While this was all quite straightforward, what I didn't anticipate was my dog peering over my shoulder to see what I was doing (I was on the floor using the coffee table) and letting loose an enormous sneeze which scattered moss bits throughout every corner of the room. I suppose that will be what spring cleaning is for.