Horseshoe Wreath

There were days in the past when I spent time cussing the skittish horse I rode because he was standing on my foot with this metal device nailed to his hoof.  No amount of pushing him or elbowing him in his belly would convince him to move even a little bit.   I have found a better use for these metal shoes!!!  Thanks to the Mr. and his ability to weld, I was able to give to my good friend Barb, this versatile door wreath.  Red for Christmas, pink for Easter, red, white and blue for the Fourth of July and so on and so on. The first picture shows the unpainted shoes placed in the pattern I decided would work and the second has been primed, painted and adorned with two western handkerchiefs.

One thing we discovered was that horseshoes are not cheap, but luckily, they are priced by the pound.  Since, we were not concerned about the weight, we went for the lighter ones. We are struggling now with additional pounds as a result of all of the wonderful food ingested over this past few days.  We had a wonderful Christmas with friends and family, however our children  and their families were missed and each year I think we miss them more.  They are miles and miles away and we have had so very much snow that they would have had bad roads or airport delays I am sure.  I  have discovered that you can't get here from there...where ever that happens to be. New projects are on the horizon, a hair-on-hide, padded headboard in the works, more progress on the previous stained glass piece and painting projects for January...posts to follow.  

So as I try to keep from shoving another piece of fudge in my face..."Lead me not into temptation; I can find the way myself."--Rita Mae Brown

Creativity

"I have too much creativity to be contained in one medium."  This is a quote I heard this week and quickly wrote down, but in my haste, I forgot the origin of the quote and don't know who should receive the credit.  I do know that I feel it totally expresses my feelings.  My greatest fear is that I will not live long enough to accomplish all that I want to do.  A few earlier posts I published a stone slice which I wanted to incorporate into a piece of stained glass and I did find the pattern which will allow me to do that.  These few pictures here will show some of the progress.  Tools, pattern and the beginning of the glass cutting process.  More pictures to follow as I progress.

Today I was able to wander back into the past with the opportunity to be among the cattle.  My good friend, Debby and I had coffee this morning and then she invited me to go with her to "feed" the cattle.  She has purchased several head of bred heifers which will calve in the spring.  We drove the ol' truck with hay bales in the bed across the snow covered field. (you need a 4 wheel drive with as much snow as we have now) All animals, including humans become creatures of habit. The cattle followed the truck, knowing that it contained their breakfast and when we came to a stop, they hurried to catch up, kicking their heels and crowding around us. As Debby broke up  the bales for them, I asked her if she had named them.  "Some", she replied.  The one with the number 69 green tag in her ear was "Bingo....you know --under O for 69".  She has named others but I don't recall their names.  As we drove down to her favorite spot near the creek and in the shelter of the trees, it reminded me that so many people would not understand what peace a place like that brings to some of us.  The snow began to fall and I remembered days as a child when we would go out and break up hay bales for the cow and horses, and break the layer of ice on the stock tank of water and the calves would splash warm milk on us as they sucked from the buckets we held for them. It was, at the time, only work for us.  We complained and it did no good.  Chores had to be done before school. Even as I did chores, I remember daydreaming about drawing, or designing a dress for my dolls, or some such creation. I don't like rules....I think they stifle creativity.  Who knows, even feeding the cows may inspire some young person's desire to be creative. 

Busy Days

Above are the shots of the leather belt that the Mr. completed for a little girl we know. She won a beautiful buckle for barrel racing and for Christmas, her mother wanted a belt with tooled horseshoes.  But the Mr. found these jeweled conchos and the belt really turned out nice.

This week has been so busy.  One day this week my very good friend, Barb, came and we spent all day baking goodies.  For 38 years this month, we have known each other.  Our friendship has endured years of drama and sadness and happiness.  We helped each other with sick children, she pushed me out of snowdrifts when my old VW got stuck, she convinced me to take classes with her.  We took tailoring classes, cake decorating classes, ceramic classes and some I can't remember. I moved away for 3 years, then she moved away for 10. We saw each other through the death of our parents, the births of our children and grandchildren.  My daughter still has the baby blanket Barb made in pink when I was thoroughly convinced I was giving birth to another boy.  But we have never quite conquered divinity.  I am speaking of the candy...although we may think we are nearly Divine.  We made two batches this week of this sticky white sugary confection.  The first was way too dry and we argued  if perhaps beating the egg white too much or the entire mixture too much was the cause of our failure.  Never to be discouraged we tried again.  Success at last, after 38 years. As I prepared to take my soaking bath that evening for my aching feet which supported me all day, I brushed my hands through my hair and to my surprise----divinity. When you insert a spatula into an electric beater before it stops moving, the substance on the beaters flies in many directions and in this case, the divinity deposited itself in my hair.  Thanks Barb!!!  (we had a great day and I hope you all are blessed with a friend as wonderful as mine).

More simple things

On Sunday mornings I sit with my cup of coffee and my two faithful dogs and the temperamental cat and watch CBS Sunday Morning News.  In this complicated world, it truly is a program of news....most often very wonderful stories.  Sometimes, they even depict stories of much simpler times.  Two stories today of particular interest were of the success of singer Michael Boble` and his Frank Sinatra  style.  For those of us who remember, that brings back memories of much simpler times.  A time for the most part after world war II, was a time of prosperity for most of the nation and we were at peace with the world.  The other story that sparked more good memories of those simple times was that of the doll house.  I am sorry that I didn't get more specifics of the featured personalities, but the miniatures were detailed down to the decorations on the Christmas trees...and when I was a child, they were ALL Christmas trees.  I didn't have a doll house as a child but my sister, Joan, did and we spent a good deal of time playing with that little tin house.  The furniture was plastic and after saving the few pennies and nickles we could get from returning pop bottles at the gas station across the street from our grandmas house, we could go to the drug store and buy a piece of furniture.  That little doll house couldn't hold a candle to the ones on today's program, but it gave us such simple pleasure.

I spent a few trips to flea markets and junk shops last spring searching for Christmas cookie cutters.  Below are the pictures of the cutters as they made their way into a garland for my kitchen. 

Sprayed with primer below , then sprayed black, then dry brushed with parchment and finally in a garland at the top.

Simple things

A warm hug from your devoted dog, a fluffy snowfall, the aroma of the turkey broth (from the Thanksgiving bird's carcass) simmering on the stove--all simple things that bring us joy!  These are some of my favorite things.  As I find myself well into the last half of my life on this earth, I also find myself remembering more of those memories from the past.  After all, that really is all that we can depend on--our memories.  My siblings will probably agree that those days when we grew up in a much less complicated era, were some of the happiest, and this time of the year causes me to reflect.  Growing up in a small town with two very frugal parents, we had no idea as children, that we were poor.  We had everything!! With five acres to romp on, and always a lot of snow, we would bundle up and head out to build snowmen, and snow forts, and throw snowballs.  As we continued to get colder and wetter, we would eventually relent and go in to warm by the oil stove in our small living room.  (We eventually got a wall furnace, but we couldn't all back up to that as easily as the oil stove.) Our thin knit gloves, and the wool "headscarves" that we girls wore didn't keep us very warm, but we sure had fun!  Mom would make snow ice cream.  It had to be clean snow of course, and then she would pour homemade syrup over it.  We had lots of chickens and a cow, so dad would make homemade eggnog.  I still make old fashioned fudge that you cook over the stove and stir forever.  Mom always made that at Christmas time.  I always saw beautiful trees at my friend's homes and vowed that I would have one when I grew up...and I did.  But we always got our tree Christmas eve and Dad would bring it home....he probably got it for a few cents and it was always such a pathetic looking tree on a wooden stand.  It truly was a Charlie Brown tree.  But after we put a lonely string of lights, and the worn tinsel and garland on and added the few old ornaments as well as the homemade ones from school projects...it was beautiful. I sit here and look at my 5 Christmas trees all decorated with lovely glass ornaments collected over the years and still remember the simpler times with family and homemade fudge and that beautiful scraggly tree.  We got a silver aluminum tree later.....not nearly as memorable. 

Not so much of a simple thing is our new Mac computer above.  Note that we had a wet bar in this area and we decided to make a home for the new computer.  My dad would be so amazed at the technology at hand now for all of us and as I post this blog, I still sometimes long for those wonderful simple things. We  had a radio as our only means of getting  news of Santa, the old wind-up Victrola, the old oil stove and fudge and the Charlie Brown tree.