A Heart-Filled Table

Don't you love it when you "meet" someone through your Etsy shop or other online shop or social network -- and you just know you'd be buddies if you met in real life? Well, Jane is like that.

She is a delightful Etsy customer who has purchased a number of my crochet cookies (I think she has a sweet tooth!). She also loves to decorate her home for the various holidays and seasons. So for Valentine's Day, she set a beautiful table and included my heart cookies! Hey, I think I see a couple of my Oreo cookies peeking out!

Jane was so sweet to send me photos of her lovely table and gave me permission to share them with you! The heart mat is just perfect under my cookies and isn't that just the cutest little heart girl! I love a little whimsy on a table!

Oh, lookee, that cute little heart girl has a boyfriend! And such a rakish fellow he is!!

Don't you just love that quilted heart mat under her candles? Beautiful! (And I'm rather enamored with her French country poulet placemats too!!)

As a crafter/seller, one of the best feelings you can have is seeing your creation in use in someone's home. It brought many smiles when Jane shared her table with me, and made me feel all giggly inside!

♥♥♥  Thank you, Jane!!  ♥♥♥

♥♥♥ Today I'm sharing Jane's Valentine table, and my heart cookies : ) on Rednesday over on It's a Very Cherry World. Click on the cute little girl to get yourself over there!

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Cross-Stitch Love and a Challenge

One of my very favorite things to do is counted cross-stitch. But there's only so many you can do to display in your home or give as gifts! Even so, I have so many designs that I'd like to do and a huge love of doing them!

Here's where Love Quilts comes in. Love Quilts is a charity organization that makes quilts for children with life threatening or life long illnesses. The children or their parents choose a theme for their quilt and stitchers sign up with a design of their choosing that fits the theme. When all the cross-stitch blocks are finished and sent in (by a certain date), they are assembled into beautiful quilts and sent off to the child.

from the Love Quilts site

The parents keep in touch and send pictures so we can get to "know" the child. Sometimes angel wings appear next to a child's name, and that is always a sad thing. But the parents have that quilt, so lovingly made for their child, to remember and hang on to. (Oh my, tears are in my eyes...) And then there are the ones who get better and stronger and your heart just grows!

The block I just completed is for Caitlyn who will turn 6 in March (the same as my granddaughter) and her theme is the word "Love" along with hearts, flowers and the color purple somewhere on the square. I saw her and knew she was the one I wanted to cross-stitch for next! If you'd like to meet Caitlyn, you can click on her name and say howdy-do and a little prayer for her.

Can you see the "V" in Love coming through my magnifying glass?  

These are the colors I'm using -- I changed the colors from the original red/pink/blue to Caitlyn's colors of pink and purple.  And, yes, that's a shower curtain hook that my floss bobbins are on!

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That was the cross-stitch love, now for the challenge part of this post!

The February challenge for the Blogging Business Artisans (BBA) Etsy team was given to us by Edi of Memories for Life. She challenged us to create a love-themed item for the month of love. So a little girl named Caitlyn, and a love-filled challenge met in my cross-stitch hoop!

I'm part way though!

I so enjoyed stitching this piece! 

Finished!

I think the word "Love" is so sweet in this design and it fits perfectly for February, the month of love, and a sweet child who has a bunch of wonderful women stitching that love just for her.

I hope you'll visit the Love Quilts site and perhaps stitch something for a child yourself! 

And be sure to visit the BBA Blog to read about our team and our talented members. 

♥♥♥  Today I'm linking up my Love Cross-Stitch to Pink Saturday over at How Sweet the Sound! Lots of lovely pinks over there!
♥♥♥  Also linking to Show and Tell Saturday at Be Different...Act Normal. Fun, fun, fun!!

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February Giveaway ~ Red and Pink and Hearts!

February is the month of Love -- not just Valentine's Day, but all month long. So, with that in mind, the BBA (Blogging Business Artisans) Etsy team is having a giveaway!

One very lucky person will win ALL of these fabulous handmade Love items! Nine in total!

I decided to include my crocheted heart cookies in the giveaway (see them there on the bottom far left).

To enter, click on the photo and that will take you to the BBA Blog post where you can see all the individual items up close. All you need to do is comment and let us know which item you love in one of the shops. Easy peasy! 

For even more entries, you can visit each participating shop and comment on your favorite item, blog about the giveaway, like the team's Facebook page, or tweet! Wow -- that's twelve entries!! All the directions are there on the blog.

So get yourself over there and enter!!  Deadline is February 21 at 11am Central Time.

♥♥♥  I'm linking the BBA Giveaway to Rednesday over at It's a Very Cherry World,

and also to Whatever You Want Wednesday hosted by Free Pretty Things. 

 Yay!!

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Rockin' Robin

He rocks in the tree top all the day long
Hoppin' and a-boppin' and a-singin' his song
All the little birdies on Jay bird street
Love to hear the robin go tweet tweet tweet

Rockin' robin -- tweet tweet tweet
Rockin' robin -- tweet tweet tweet
Oh rockin' robin, well you're really gonna rock tonight.

I happened to look out in the backyard and there was all this scratching and fluttering and leaves flying about -- so I, as quietly as possible, opened the back door and, miracles of miracles -- only a few flew away! Fortunately, my camera was near so I stood in the doorway and zoomed in.

Robins causing all that commotion. They were digging around looking for food and were really tearing up the place!  They were neat to see.  There were probably six or eight in the yard.

This guy looks like he's found several meals, and has gotten his fill!

Most of the time there are only doves with a cardinal or two. I love to see the cardinals (there's a pair that must live nearby because they come together to feast in my yard.) but, unfortunately, I never seem to be able to get a picture.


♥♥♥ Today I'm linking my backyard robins to Rednesday over at It's a Very Cherry World. Fly on over and discover some more rockin' reds !!


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