Red Twinkle Light Heart

 Everyone love's twinkle lights.  So why not take some red ones and make a big heart?  Made from chicken wire and several strands of lights and Presto!  You've got yourself a unique, one of a kind, super cool light.

 Did I mention I love twinkle lights?  Giant globes tossed into the tree branches are great too.

A Cupcake Kind of Day (again) - pink cupcake painting

6x6" oil on panel.  .  Recently I noticed that my 1000 blog post has come and gone.  How did I miss that?  It has got me thinking about my first blog post - 7 years ago!!!  Wow.
 You can see my very first POST here.  Many, many cupcake paintings later and way better  photo editing skills these days. (thankfully) 
Today is another cupcake kind of day for sure.

Tuesday are "Teach Art Tuesdays" - I've got my kinders (who I love) and also in the afternoon I've got a group of preschoolers that stay for "Art Enrichment"  - this is how I kept them busy last week- we made Valentine Garlands - practicing our cutting skills! and printed our hands over a foam heart which leaves an adorable print! We made little collage frames for these today - SO Simple and Sweet, my favorite.

Valentine Sugar Cookies and free printable Valentines

 nfdp

 Never one for a store bought holiday - my Valentine's Day treats are homemade and simple.  It is such a sweet little holiday, why muck it up with "stuff"?  My father brought home heart sugar cookies from the bakery one year when we were kids and they have become a tradition for my family ever since.  This year I decided to bake my own using my trusty Christmas Sugar Cookie recipe.  There are many, use whichever you like best.  Grab a heart cookie cutter and some red sugar and bake up a batch.

   Now for the gift tags... 

                                                            Simple AND sweet, right?
 Now for you my dear sweet readers a free printable of my little Valentine tags!  Download HERE.
Print them out on some card stock, cut them, use your little 'corner rounder' if you have one and punch a hole to create tags. Sweet.

A Winter Walk

 nfdp - A Winter walk at dusk at Sachuest Pt. in Middletown RI.  One of my favorite places.  We are all here to not only see the snowy owls who are visiting but also the barn owl that has been making his sunset appearance lately.

Beach Walk

 16x20 oil on canvas  I just got this back from the Save the Bay show.  So warm and summery unlike today...ahhh summer dreamin'

Winter Love

 nfdp

A Little Beach #4

 6x6" oil on panel.  Another little beach painting.  This one is ready to hang.  The messy sides will be cleaned up of course.

 Treated myself to new brushes!!  Hooray.  I paint almost exclusively with "brights".  My favorites, I promise to take good care of these this time.

Garland Love

nfdp   February already - can you believe it?  I always get in a super crafty mood in February.  When I (finally) put the last of the Christmas decorations away I peeked in my Valentines Day storage box and found this garland that I made a few years ago.  It features the loves of my life and I used to hang it in the kitchen window above the sink...

 I used leftover wrapping paper from the holidays, some twine, simple photocopies of my husband and 3 boys and a sharpie.  Easy and cost free!!

 my youngest looks about 7 here, he is 15 now - don't tell him I posted this... little cutie.

 This year I thought I would make another garland and this is it:

 I had all this felt and decided that a garland across my fireplace is what I needed.  So I broke out my "SIMPLE" sewing machine ----yeah right!  Sewing to me is like high school algebra - my brain freezes up just looking at this machine BUT in the interest of DIY I gave it a go

 so far so good...until about 3 minutes in.  Trouble starts.  Luckily I was wise enough to save the directions!!

 Bobbin trouble - as usual!  It's always the bobbin.  Then just poor sewing skills.  Got it together a bit after a while.  Now you sewers out there can probably do a MUCH better job than me and I hope you do because the results are super cute!