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Archive for the ‘Creativity’ Category

Friday’s Fresh Five! (4/16/10)

Posted in About me, Creativity, Helping Others, In The Kitchen, inspiration, Recipes, Recycling, tagged , , , , , , on April 16, 2010| 2 Comments »

This photo says it all. It’s that kind of day. It’s a hula-hooping, sun-shining day and, even though I sound like I live on Sesame Street, I feel that way. Today’s my birthday and I’m celebrating the gift of this very lovely day!

#1 – Gifts That Help
Finding gifts for others can be difficult, but at charitablegiving.com it is not only easy to find unique gifts, it is also helping to fulfill the needs of others. The blog states, The purpose of this blog is to find some of the best stuff you can buy on the Web where a portion of the proceeds are donated to a charity or other non-profit organization in need.

We’ll surf major retailing sites, as well as mom-and-pop sites, to find the best out there. Whether you buy these products as gifts for others or for yourself, you can feel great about your purchase, knowing that you’re not just buying a gift, but helping a great cause too.

Not only does this blog post about products and causes, but it also invites its readers to post about other cause-worthy products. The upside is that you’re exposed to a lot of wonderful products for sale and feel good while buying. The downside is the need to be a smart buyer. Check out the cause and the organization to your satisfaction before making any purchases.

#2 – Creative Gift Wrapping
When wrapping gifts try to think outside the box. Be creative and resourceful. Try to reuse items you have on hand. Here are a couple of ideas to get you going:

Potato Chip Bags:
It’s not as weird as you think! Turn the bag inside out and wash it with soap and warm water. Completely wipe it dry. Wrap your item in tissue paper and put item in the bag. Fold the bag ends in and use double-sided tape to seal. This is a good way to wrap irregularly shaped items and the silver look is interesting. Different sized chip bags for different sized gifts!

Tubes:
Toilet paper tubes, paper towel tubes, wrapping paper tubes – they’re all the same except for length. Wrap your gift item with tissue paper first, then insert into the tube. Either cut paper or cardboard circles and tape to seal the ends shut or just put packing tape over the ends. Wrap the gift in a piece of paper that is 3-4 inches longer than the tube on each end. Twist the paper ends and tie ribbon on twists. This will look more or less like a piece of candy. If you don’t like that look, wrap it with paper and fold down the ends in pleats and tape.

Reading Materials:
Magazines and newspapers are obvious choices for wrapping, but consider old calendars, postcards (wrap these around tubes), and shopping bags.

#3 – Give the Gift of a Book
According to the Concise Oxford English Dictionary, “Bookcrossing is the practice of leaving a book in a public place to be picked up and read by others, who then do likewise.” At BookCrossing.com, “Where 854,720 people in over 130 countries come to share their passion for books with the world,” you can sign up for free to become a member and learn how to begin registering and tracking books left in public places.

#4 – My Gift To You
Here’s a recipe for butter cookies that I’ve had since I was a child. Easy to make and delicious to eat!

1 cube butter
1 cup flour
1 egg
1 cup sugar
1 tsp. vanilla

Mix all ingredients together and drop by small teaspoonfuls. Bake at 375 degrees for 8-10 minutes. Enjoy!

#5 – Consider The Present
Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. And today? Today is a gift. That’s why we call it the present. ~Babatunde Olatunji

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A Tisket, A Tasket

Posted in Art and Crafts, Creativity, Holidays, tagged , , , , , on April 14, 2010| 2 Comments »

The old song goes, “A tisket, a tasket, a green and yellow basket . . .” except in my case the baskets were pearlized baby blue. For Easter dinner I wanted to make something special for each of my guests, so I searched the internet and found a project on AllFreeCrafts.com. I made cute little paper baskets, filled them with my favorite chocolate Cadbury Mini Eggs, and placed one basket at each place setting on the dining table. Because they are easy to make, I thought they could make sweet flower-filled Mother’s Day Brunch favors as well.

Supplies you will need to make these baskets:

*Stiff paper – construction paper or card stock
*Pencil,  embossing tool, or a small point knitting needle
*Ruler
*Scissors
*Hole Punch
*Brad fasteners
*Candy or tiny flowers (in which case you’ll need plastic condiment cups, too)

Instructions:

To make a template, measure and draw a 4-1/2″ square on stiff paper. Divide the square into nine equal squares with your pencil and ruler. Round off each corner with your scissors. Measure and cut out a handle template that is 6″ long by 5/8″ wide. Using your ruler as a straight edge, score the lines that form your nine-square grid. To do this place your ruler on a vertical line and run the embossing tool down the line. Repeat with the remaining vertical line and the two horizontal lines. Now fold the template along these lines.

Place your template on top of your paper and trace around it with a pencil or an embossing tool. I favor the embossing tool because it does not leave any marks that have to be erased later. It only leaves indentations. If you have a fine point knitting needle, this could be used as well. Repeat the procedure for the handle.

Do not remove the template. To score your basket so it can be folded, carefully place your ruler on top of your template and paper (make sure template and paper are lined up according to your tracing) along one of the vertical lines. Fold back the template along the rulers edge, and run the embossing tool down the edge. Repeat procedure on the remaining vertical line and two horizontal lines.

Cut the rounded-square and the handle out. Cut two slits along the center top and center bottom squares.To form one side of a basket, fold two round edges over a center square until they overlap. Punch with a tiny hole punch or fat needle through the three layers. Also punch a hole into each end of the handle making sure your you’ve left at least 1/4″ of paper at the end.

Again fold two round edges over the center square, lining up the holes. Now insert one end of the handle in between the center square and the overlapping rounded ends. Line up the holes and stick a brad in securely. If you do not have mini brads, you could use a staple and then cover the staple with a sticker. Repeat the procedure for the other side of the basket and handle.

Either fill the completed basket with candy or put a disposable plastic condiment cup in the basket. Fill the cup with a little bit of water and arrange some tiny flower stems in it.

Little baskets of flowers would also be very pretty additions to a bridal shower table-scape. Vary the paper or even enlarge the template to make larger baskets. Only your imagination limits you as to how these little baskets can be used!

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Hard Day’s Night

Posted in About me, Creativity, Photography, tagged , , , on March 31, 2010| 2 Comments »

“It’s been a hard day’s night, and I’ve been working like a dog.” This Beatle’s song lyric plays through my head as I walk through the back door. I feel fatigue settle upon me as I remove my shoes. My feet hurt from wearing “fashionable” shoes and from being on my feet for most of the day. I tell my husband it had been a “Calgon take me away” kind of day. As I say that, the visual image of soaking in a tub of billowy bubbles, seems like the very thing to do to sooth my weary bones.

With the warm water running, I pour in some lavender-scented bubble bath and watch bubbles miraculously form. “Bubbles are spherical because of surface tension, but the tension that lurks on the surface of your life will evaporate once you sink into an Aura Cacia bubble bath” reads the label. Ah, so wise are the marketers of Calgon and Aura Cacia products.

A heavenly cloud of bubbles beckons me to feel its silky froth. After lighting wonderfully fragrant candles and dimming the bathroom lights, I gently slip into the tub and close my eyes. Minutes of reverie later, I open my eyes and gaze at the mounds of bubbles. How strong, yet delicate the spheres appear to be. As the top most part of the mounds begin popping, they transform into pieces of surreal lacework enhanced by candlelight. I look at this piece of art in front of my eyes and then feel the need to look at it from all sides; I plunge deeper into the water to look straight up at it. I call to my husband to bring me my camera! I snap photo after photo trying to capture the glittery mass of soap and air before me.

I can hardly contain my excitement as I dress and run down the stairs to my computer. The downloaded images are interesting, but my Ambien-enhanced brain says they need tweaking, so I play around with the exposure settings and color adjustments until the medication takes over . . .

There you have it folks! That’s the history of the mystery photo. The correct answer to the contest is bubbles! The photo above is a more revealing view of the bubbles in my bubble bath. Now that you know the answer, I bet all of you will look at the photo and say, “Yes, that’s it!”

Thanks to all of you who submitted guesses. I sincerely enjoyed reading each and every one of them! From this sampling of guesses – from sneezes to my granite counter top to blue speckled granite ware pots to flash reflection in a mirror – you can see the great depth of imagination everyone used in trying to figure out the subject matter.

Stay tuned! The winner of the contest and the winner’s prize will be revealed in an upcoming post! And if you liked the photo of the bubbles and this contest, you should see the photo I have in mind for my next contest!

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It’s a Contest!

Posted in Creativity, Jewelry, Photography, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , , on March 10, 2010| 9 Comments »

To celebrate the six-month anniversary of What About This? I’m holding a contest! Who doesn’t like a contest when you can win a cool prize? Be the first person to identify the subject matter in the above photo. Not the header photo, but the one below it.

Send your best guess via email to me. To keep it fair, only ONE guess per email address, please. The first person to correctly guess the subject matter of the photo will be the winner and will win a one-of-a-kind, sterling silver, hand-stamped affirmation charm – which you help to design – on a sterling silver chain. It will be somewhat similar to the What Would You Say design and the Walls Have Doors design that were previously posted on this blog. I’ll work with the winner to come up with a short affirmation consisting of up to four words, but I do reserve the right to select the final artistic design. So that I can mail the winner this fabulous prize, he/she will have to provide me with a name and address.

Good Luck! Be on the look out for notification of your win in a future post! The winning affirmation design will be featured in an upcoming post on my blog, too!

Sorry, this contest is restricted to people residing in the continental United States only.

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Equal Time For Fortune Cookies

Posted in Art and Crafts, Creativity, Holidays, Recipes, tagged , , , , , , , on February 10, 2010| Leave a Comment »

My last post was all about Valentine’s cookies, but this coming Sunday, February the 14th, is not only Valentine’s Day, it’s also the first day of the Chinese new year 4707. According to the L.A. Times, “This is a rare convergence — it’s only the third time since 1900 – and it won’t happen again until after 2030. Added to that, it’s the year of the Tiger, which traditionally symbolizes great passion.”

So why not celebrate both passion-filled holidays at the same time? Here are a few ideas for ways to incorporate these two distinct holidays into your upcoming holiday meal planning and table decorating:

1. Using Paula Deen’s recipe make your own fortune cookies and fill them with romantic fortunes. Even better, whether homemade or store bought, dip the ends of fortune cookies into melted chocolate, then dip into toppings of your choice such as Valentine-colored sprinkles, chopped nuts, coconut shavings, or finely chopped white chocolate. Let cool. Serve for dessert.

2. Decorate Chinese take out boxes with stickers or use rubber stamps and emboss the boxes. Place one at each place setting and serve fresh salad or delicious pasta inside of them. Stick in a pair of chopsticks and you’re good to go!

3. Make Chinese fortune cookies out of felt a la Martha Stewart and tuck Hershey Kisses and personalized fortunes into them. Scatter these on the dining table, place them in a bowl, or use them as party favors.

4. Use rice in your candlescapes by arranging candle pillars on a platter and pour and smooth white rice around them.

5. Set your table with napkins folded to resemble fortune cookies.

Materials Needed:
Solid-colored light brown or tan-colored cloth napkins
Paper strips and pens or computer printed fortunes

How to Fold Fortune Cookie Napkins:
A. Place napkin completely flat, right side down on an even surface.

B. Bring lower edge up about one third of the napkin height.

C. Fold down the top of the already folded napkin so that the top third of the napkin covers the bottom third. You should have a rectangle at this point.

D. Hold your thumb at the center top of the rectangle and fold the right half under itself and pull down so it extends about 3 inches below the edge of the rectangle.

E. Repeat a mirror image fold with the left half.

F. Fold up each of the two corners of the left tail so that they meet at the base of the large triangle and form a new triangle with the point at the bottom. Repeat with the right tail.

G. Fold the left tail up so that it touches the top point of the large triangle and creates a rectangle.

H. Fold the rectangle in half to form your fortune cookie. Turn it over so that the slit side is up. Place “giant” paper fortunes in them.

Gung Hay Fat Choy!

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Sweet Valentines: Making Shortbread Cookies for Valentine’s Day

Posted in Creativity, Gift Ideas, Holidays, In The Kitchen, Recipes, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on February 8, 2010| 1 Comment »

These are my signature Valentine’s Day cookies, but making them tends to be a love-hate type of situation for me. I love that decorating theses cookies brings out my inner Picasso, but because they require so much time and patience, I hate making them. I say “hate” lightly, though. I admit working with the icing can be challenging, but it is also therapeutic. Even though the cookies in the photo are all of the same design, I enjoy experimenting with the flow of the icing and creating new designs. No two are ever exactly the same and after sitting at my kitchen table for hours straight on end, they are always a labor of love.

This type of project is always more fun when shared with others. What about this? Why not host a Valentine’s Day cookie-decorating party for your friends? If you don’t feel like baking, order undecorated sugar cookies from your local bakery or grocery store’s bakery. The fun will be in the decorating and the time spent with friends.

Shortbread Valentine’s Day Cookies:
(Original recipe is from Martha Stewart)

1-1/2 C unsalted butter, softened
¾ C sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 C unbleached all-purpose flour
1 C cornstarch
Icing recipe below

Cream together the butter and sugar in a large bowl. Stir in the vanilla.

Sift together the flour and cornstarch and then stir this into the creamed mixture. Place the dough on a sheet of plastic wrap and form the dough into a round disc. Wrap the dough and chill it for at least 2 hours.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Line the baking sheets with parchment paper. Roll out the dough on a lightly floured surface and cut out heart shapes with a cookie cutter. Bake for 5-8 minutes. These cookies remain a pale color. Carefully remove from baking sheets and cool on racks. Spread on icing and let icing dry until shell forms. Store in an airtight container.

Makes about four dozen cookies.

Icing:
3-1/2 C confectioners’ sugar, sifted
3 large egg whites, lightly beaten
½ tsp fresh lemon juice
Food coloring (I use Wilton’s gel icing colors)

In a medium bowl, combine the confectioners’ sugar, egg whites, and lemon juice. Blend until smooth.

Divide icing into small bowls. Add food colors. Blend the colors thoroughly. Make in small batches as necessary. Apply icing to cookies using small brushes. Stir individual bowls occasionally to prevent icing from hardening.

Makes enough for four dozen cookies.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

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What Would You Say?

Posted in Art and Crafts, Creativity, Gift Ideas, inspiration, Jewelry, Parenting, Style and fashion, tagged , , , , , on January 5, 2010| 4 Comments »

If you could only pass on three words of advice to your child, what would you say? Last fall a silver charm at a craft fair caught my eye. It very simply read, “Spread Joy.” With a blog tag line of “sharing and encouraging joy in life,” this charm was meant to be mine. I put it on a chain and started wearing it as an affirmation of what I was trying to accomplish in life.

According to Wikipedia, “Affirmations in New Age and New Thought terminology refer primarily to the practice of positive thinking – fostering a belief that ‘a positive mental attitude supported by affirmations will achieve success in anything.'” More simply put, an affirmation is a positive thought that you keep in your mind and the more you think about it and believe in it, the more likely it will happen.

I thought about buying my daughter a charm, too, but what words or saying would inspire her? One thought lead to another until the idea grew into, “What about making one-of-a-kind affirmation necklaces for her as well as six of my nieces for Christmas?”

To do so I needed a little help. I asked each of my sisters-in-law to come up with words of advice that she would like to pass on to her daughter(s). The moms had no idea why I needed these words. I felt that if I told them it was for a piece of jewelry, it would cloud their word selection. The exercise proved to be challenging, because it forced the moms to reflect on the unique qualities of each daughter and to choose from their life’s book of wisdom one concept to distill into a mere three words. Of course, it didn’t help that I presented them with this assignment during the hectic holiday season! In different forms, they all managed to give me food for thought.

My husband, my daughter, and I spent an evening interpreting and shortening the mothers’ information, until we were satisfied we had captured the essence of what each was trying to convey to her daughter(s). That was the difficult part of the necklace-making project.

The easy part came next. My husband and I cut pieces out of a sheet of sterling silver, filed the edges smooth, hand stamped each letter of every word, oxidized, punched holes, and polished them. The stamped affirmation charms along with other specially selected charms were attached to chains and a loving letter of explanation was written to accompany each necklace.

What three words did I choose for my daughter? After a little thought, the words came easily to me. In Amy Tan’s book The Joy Luck Club there is a recurring theme: Know Your Worth. These are words I want my daughter to carry in her heart – she must never undervalue herself in any relationship or in any circumstance in life.

When all seven of these young ladies wear their affirmation necklaces, I hope they’ll believe in the positive power of the words written on their charms and that they appreciate the wisdom of their mothers.

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Oh Christmas Tree . . .

Posted in About me, Art and Crafts, Creativity, Holidays, Kids, Parenting, tagged , , , on December 21, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Crystal snowflakes sparkle as they dangle from chandeliers, Santa guides his sleigh from high above his lookout in the family room, and Christmas fairies gently perch on the mantle above the stove top to supervise holiday cooking. My home seems to come alive during the holidays.

One of the first things I rush to decorate every year is my kitchen tree. It’s a small tree that stands near my bookcase of cookbooks and it’s covered with measuring spoons and measuring cups, cinnamon hearts and gingerbread men, cookie cutters tied with ribbons, and cookie dough ornaments. It’s a happy, homey-type of tree.

Some of my fondest memories are centered around Christmas trees. As a young child I remember stringing the giant and hot Christmas lights around and around the tree and then throwing the lead tinsel up in the air and watching it land on little precipices of evergreen.

Then when I got married, a Christmas tree became a luxury item, because we lived off of my meager salary while my husband was in graduate school. We bought a tree to decorate – it was only a three-footer, but it was our first three-foot tree! And amazingly enough, when we stood it on a crate it became a five-foot giant! With no money for ornaments, I remember crafting my own out of dough, wood, and whatever material I could find cheaply. For the garland, I patted myself on the back for cleverly thinking of stringing foam packing peanuts on dental floss. From far away my garland really did resemble strands of popcorn.

With the birth of each of my children came new tree decorating traditions. Every year I purchased an ornament for each child that represented some milestone in his life for that year. Our family tree has become filled with Sesame Street characters, Disney characters, unique child-crafted ornaments made from pine cones, macaroni, toilet paper rolls, etc., dog-related ornaments, sports-related paraphernalia, ornaments picked up from our family vacations, school mascots, symbolic ornaments such as cars (representing driver’s licenses) and mini beer steins or mini champagne bottles (celebrating 21st birthdays). You name it and we probably have it on our tree! As old as my kids are now, they still ask me what their ornament for the year is and I have to admit it is getting more difficult to find those special ornaments that represent significant moments in their adult lives!

Would I trade my family’s memory tree filled with rag-tag, random ornaments for a designer tree? Never in a million years! When I first decided to have a tree like this for our family, my thought was that as each child grew up and finally had a home of his own, he could take his childhood collection of ornaments with him. Hopefully, as he reflects on his ornaments, each child will remember the happy moments in his life and the love our family shares.

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Tablecloths Masquerading as Tree Skirts

Posted in Art and Crafts, Creativity, Holidays, tagged , , , , , , , on December 17, 2009| 1 Comment »

As I roamed through store after store one year searching for a Christmas tree skirt that was proportional to my large tree and that matched my decor, I became frustrated because all I could find were dinky little tree skirts at exorbitant prices. Then a thought occurred to me, “What about using a round tablecloth as a tree skirt?”

Tablecloths can be found in a variety of diameters, fabrics, and colors and you’re more likely to find a tablecloth that matches your home’s decor than a tree skirt! Consider purchasing a round tablecloth at stores like T.J. Maxx, Ross, Marshall’s or Tuesday Morning.

Here’s how I convert tablecloths into tree skirts:
1. Fold the tablecloth in half, then in quarters, and finally in eighths.
2. With a pair of fabric scissors or very sharp scissors, cut the point off the top of the folded fabric following the curve of the hemmed edge to create the hole for the tree trunk. Depending on the diameter of your tree trunk you’ll want to cut about one to two inches from the point, because when you finally open up the fabric, you’ll have a two to four inch hole.
3. Next while the fabric is still folded in eighths, cut a fold from the bottom of the hem all the way up to the cut you just made. This provides an opening in the tablecloth that enables you to drape it around the tree.
4. Using Mighty Mendit, a product advertised on television, you can glue some type of braiding or trim around the raw edge of the center hole and the two cut edges of the side opening. An alternative to this is folding the raw edges under a half-inch and hemming them on your sewing machine. A third option is to just leave the edges raw and tuck them under every year so that no one notices them. As you can probably guess, this is the option I’ve always chosen!

Note: The photo shows a 70″ round tablecloth around the base of a 9′ tree.

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Project Pomander

Posted in Art and Crafts, Creativity, Gift Ideas, tagged , , , , , , on December 9, 2009| Leave a Comment »

There’s nothing new about pomanders. As a matter of fact pomanders were used in the late Middle Ages through the 17th century to protect against infection and mask against bad smells. Today pomanders are primarily used as room fresheners. According to Wikipedia, the word pomander originates from the French “pomme d’ambre, i.e. apple of amber, is a ball made of perfumes, such as ambergris (whence the name), musk, or civet.”

Modern day pomanders are generally apples or citrus fruit studded with whole cloves. To spice up my life (Ha! Ha!) and get me in the mood for Christmas, I decided to make some citrus pomanders. I purchased oranges, lemons, limes and a jar of whole cloves. Costco is a good place to purchase these items in bulk and inexpensively. Because I didn’t want my home to smell like a dentist’s office, I decided not to follow tradition and chose not to cover the entire surface of the fruit. Hearts, stars, and patterns were more in line with my style.

I washed the fruit first and poured the cloves in a little bowl. If you are really a detail-type person, you could separate in advance the headless cloves from the head-still-intact ones. Unbelievably, I did not do this. Working on a plate, I selected the side of the fruit I wanted to highlight and used cookie cutters to outline the desired design. Holding the cookie cutter in place, I gently poked holes around the outside of the cookie cutter with a bamboo skewer. The cutter may have to be gently rocked from side to side to adequately work the design around the contour of the fruit. Space the holes about one-fourth inch apart, or for a denser-looking design, place them closer together. Push a whole clove into each of the holes.

Had I checked in with Martha Stewart first, I would have used rubber bands to create straight lines and would have shaken my pomanders in Orrisroot (available at health food stores) which is a perfume fixative. Live and learn!

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