Rena Designs Ornaments!

Thought I would  make a gift for the ladies that head up the committee for Ponte Vedra Players Womens Club, that is where I'll be doing my presentation. I chose to do Ornaments!
I started with 4" styrofoam balls, and using all my little bits and pieces I saved, I am a crafter and even if it's an inch long, I just have to save it, cuz ya never know!! The first ball I covered in the silk flowers I got by taking apart a lei, added a coordinating ribbon, White satin finish ornament, white shell, white pearls, fluffy pom, glitter leaves and branches. The second one I covered with the red netting from an onion bag, yep an onion bag! I keep it all! lol! Added burgundy leaves, pink satin balls, red mirror berries, pink berries, and glitter  branches. I think they will love them! I hope you'll try little fun projects like this, they're so easy, and a great way to get the creative juices flowing!

My Presentation in November!

I have been getting ready for my November presentation. These are so much fun , I give decorating ideas for the Holidays, do a tutorial on napkin folding and show all how to tie beautiful bows and store them correctly. A lot of my groups are Women's Clubs, Luncheon Groups etc. These are made up of all ages but so many are of the Mature persuasion. I try to encourage them to decorate for themselves, as so many have stopped because they don't have Kids or Family to visit. I stress the importance of doing it for their own happiness. I show them how to make a small vignette on a dining room table or to just put some favorite ornaments in a dish that they will pass everyday, it doesn't have to be a full tree, but just seeing a few of the things you used to decorate with can truly lift your heart. I also make two arrangements that they raffle off. This year I noticed in so many of the Holiday Decorating sites they were using more sleighs this year, and they have also shown pitchers as the containers for their arrangements, so I did the same. The Sleigh was a find at a Church Bazaar, and the Pitcher was from a friend years ago, the gift was well used and she would love the idea of my passing it on for someone else to love!

Since the pitcher had a more rustic look, I kept with a Forest Theme. I saw on Pinterest the decorated pine cone and decided to try it and I loved the way it turned out! Just a really fun way to use up all those ribbon pieces we tend to save for what I don't know! Cut ribbon about 2 1/2 inches long and glue ends together, take one of your loops and put a dab of glue on the end and insert in between the petals of the cone, start by using a slightly wider ribbon for the top row and then alternate your rows of coordinating ribbon the rest of the way. Put a little decoration on top, I used red glitter berries and made another loop of ribbon and glued in the middle for the hanger. I added this to the side of the arrangement and finished off with a wide red bow.

With the Sleigh, I stuck with the same theme of Forest. Using a big gnarly Poinsettia, Pine boughs covered in Snow, red ornaments and finished it off with Red and Green Plaid Ribbons, and I love the pieces of red glitter loops! For some reason my pictures are showing Fuchsia, but believe me thy are true Christmas Red!

Halloween 2012

After such a pitiful turnout of Trick or Treaters this year, of which I only had nine! Two groups of four and a single little Mermaid, I started thinking of all the fun time we were privileged to experience on Halloween. Those days are long gone my friend! Seemed the whole neighborhood was involved in this fun night, people turned their garages in to haunted houses, with spaghetti in bowls (brains) grapes in bowls (eyeballs) mashed potatoes in bowls (snot) soft carrots in bowls (fingers), they would blindfold us and lead us through, all of us
screaming as we reached in and felt the brains, eyeballs, snot and fingers! Dads would have scary elevator rides, a board perched on top of two one gallon paint cans, blindfold us, have us stand on the board then they would grab each end of the board and lift it a little and as they did this they would start crouching down, and our hands that were grabbing hold of their shoulders could feel the sensation of going high up into the air, of course we would jump off screaming thinking we were a mile high, hit the dirt that we were only six inches off of, with a thud, jamming our knees up to our foreheads! We were running in groups of at least ten to twenty, ghosts, witches, hobo's, bloody faces, long fang fake teeth, ballerina's, gipsy's, cowboys, indians, sailors, mind you most of all these costumes were home made, all of us and a gazillion other groups of kids, running and screaming "Trick or Treat", holding out our pillowcases, then on to the next house! Bags heavy, running home to empty and head right back out! Oh and getting homemade popcorn balls wrapped in cellophane, homemade chocolate chip cookies in little white bags, apples, oranges, and a really good house gave out nickles!! do you know how much candy we could get with that nickle!! and we all knew who's mom was the "Good" cook! And we were "Alone", we did not have each one of us hosting ten adults following with flashlights!  Now in my neighborhood, of which is a very nice one, most people turn out their lights, and do not give out candy, how sad is that! One year I put on a scary mask and a huge purple tulle skirt around my neck, but when I came to the door a mother yelled at me for scaring her kids...wha?? BALLS! This holiday has really turned into more of an adult thing, we are the ones wearing the costumes and having elaborate parties, spaghetti in bowls, grapes in bowls, I guess we're trying to get back that long lost feeling of running free, screaming, the tingling of being scared! Halloween!

Dixie Boy looking out the glass door, I think he spies a Goblin coming!

The Mantel all ready for the night, Halloween Night!