02 Thursday Apr 2015
Posted in Easter, encouragement
Easter dinner was over and we were feeling festive. Then the chicks stood up to make a statement. Everyone listened, even the cat who was rather confused.
Teamwork is not underrated, especially when you’re little and the opponent is big.
Never give up!
29 Sunday Mar 2015
Posted in All Sparkled Up, art, Easter, food
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Every year I save one colored Easter egg in the back of the egg bin in the fridge. All winter long it’s a nice reminder that spring is on the way.
Soon this egg will be replaced with a new one. Its fun seeing art in the refrigerator! I’m planning on hanging a little painting on one of those pristine white walls.
15 Thursday May 2014
Posted in All Sparkled Up, crafts, Easter, home decor
The tiny crystal beads on the egg tree catch light in the new window.
I’ve decided to keep the egg tree with little hanging plants in the window a bit longer. This is the first spring with the new window and I enjoy the sunshine streaming through the crystal beads on the tiny plants.
13 Tuesday May 2014
Posted in Easter
I finally had time to wash the plastic Easter eggs. Once dry, they will be put away for another year.
20 Sunday Apr 2014
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Posted by Julia Monroe | Filed under All Sparkled Up, Easter, Inspirational, photography, Scripture
02 Tuesday Apr 2013
Posted in All Sparkled Up, Easter, family
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dancing, dress, family, granddaughter, spinning, Spinning Tales
My daughter-in-law entered a drawing and won several amazing items from Spinning Tales, a company that makes the most charming spinning dresses ever. Here is a photo of my granddaughter spinning in this dress.
My granddaughter spins in her Spinning Tales dress.
My son Gabe Monroe took this photo, beautifully capturing the dreamy moment.
24 Sunday Mar 2013
Posted in All Sparkled Up, crafts, Easter, family, home decor, miniature
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1960's, 1960's crafts, 1968, crafts, decorated eggs, DIY, Easter, Easter Egg Tree, egg tree, eggs
My mom was going to throw out the decorated Easter Eggs she made in 1968. They were dusty, damaged and bug-eaten. Then she considered giving them to someone to salvage any useable trims. Of course I wanted them, cracked shells and all! They cleaned up beautifully.
Egg tree eggs, made in 1968 by my mom. My sisters and I made some of these eggs, but not the prettiest.
At first glance, these seem like really simple eggs compared to the lavish rubber-stamped, lace-trimmed, glittered eggs made today. What makes these eggs so remarkable was the creativity with such limited supplies. My mom had very little to work with. She used poster paint, nail polish and a couple jars of my brother’s model car paints to paint the eggs. There was no shiny spray-on acrylic finish back then so she used clear nail polish to make them shiny. She purchased the gold paper trim from a mail order catalog from Lee Wards, a huge craft store in another state. There was no internet from which to buy craft supplies. There were no big Walmart craft aisles, Michael’s or craft stores. The only place for craft supplies was the local 5 & Dime store and even there, craft supplies were extremely limited.
Some of these eggs are missing pearls, some have bent trim, some have cracked shells. But when they are hung on the tree, they are all beautiful together.
1968 Decorated Egg – the Blue Egg with a tiny plastic dove inside.
1968 Decorate Egg – The Purple Egg.
1968 Decorated Egg – My mom painted this egg with a jar of my brother’s model car paint. The plastic hollow sequin “gems” on each side were precious and I was in awe of them.
1968 Decorated Egg – The Yellow Rose Egg. A tiny sequin butterfly flutters above the plastic rose.
1968 Decorated Egg – Painted with poster paint, covered with clear nail polish.
1968 Decorated Egg – I love the spring green color of this egg. I have a couple plastic flowers like those used on this egg so I will restore it before putting it away at the end of the season.
1968 Decorated Egg – A pink sequin butterfly flutters over a pink fabric rose. My mom didn’t have much gold paper trim so she cut it apart and used pieces sparingly.
1968 Decorated Egg. – The Hot Air Balloon egg.
1968 Decorated egg – The Lavender Spiral egg.
1968 Decorated Egg – The Purple Rickrack and Gold Trim egg.
1968 Decorated Egg – Painted with poster paint, brushed shiny with clear nail polish.
1968 Decorated Egg – Painted with pink nail polish.
1968 Decorate Egg – The Bunny Basket Egg. This was one of the few eggs I made for the tree. Even though the bright colors didn’t fit in with my mom’s elegant color scheme, she graciously added it to the family tree. That’s true Mother’s love.
1968 Decorated Egg – The back of the pink rose egg, with a very design of pink rick rack and gold paper trim.
1968 Decorated Egg – my favorite: The elegant M Egg. I don’t know where my mom got the embroidered M trim. M was for our last name – Musser.
1968 Decorated Egg – The Lily Egg. I love how this egg has one side white, the other green. This egg was so shattered on the top that I had to flip it over and reattach the wire on the bottom so it could hang. The little plastic lilies were just tucked inside so they were easy to turn right side up.
The only non-1968 eggs on the tree are the Peter Rabbit Eggs, purchased from Pottery Barn Kids several years ago. My mom used to read Peter Rabbit to my sisters, brother and I so I was thrilled to find eggs featuring illustrations from Peter Rabbit. Here Mrs Rabbit is fastening the brass buttons on Peter Rabbit’s blue jacket.
Even though these eggs have missing beads and cracked shells, they are still so precious. When I look at them, I am reminded of simpler times, days of ingenuity, days crafting with my sisters, days of being read to by a mother that loved us. This little egg tree serves to remind me that it doesn’t take a studio of amazing craft supplies to make something all sparkled up, it just takes an eye for beauty and a determination to make do with what you have.
19 Tuesday Mar 2013
Posted in All Sparkled Up, beading, crafts, Easter, flowers, gardening, home decor, miniature, sparkling, tutorial
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All Sparkled Up, crafts, Easter, Easter decoration, Easter Egg Tree, egg tree, miniature, miniature eggs, miniature flowers, miniature plants
Last year I posted about the Hanging Plant Easter Egg Tree I made. It’s time to get it out again. Adding the drops of dew was my favorite part.
After I finished each miniature plant, with it’s tiny leaves and petals, I hung it on the tree. Though pretty, the plant didn’t seem fully alive it was all sparkled up with spring rain or drops of dew.
For each drop, I used tweezers to dab a single crystal seed bead in tacky glue and attach it where it should go, hanging from the tip of a leaf or puddled in the folds of a petal.
The tree was from Pottery Barn a couple years ago. The hanging egg baskets were cut from small plastic eggs. The miniature plants were made by cutting up full-size artificial flowers and leaves. Some of the hanging vines were made by gluing hand-cut leaves to artificial plant stems. Click on photos to see the full size images if you wish.
Miniature Daisies.
Miniature daisies.
Miniature Lily of the Valley.
Miniature ferns and moss.
Miniature Forget-me-not.
Miniature Burros Tail.
If you want to add realistic drops to an artificial plant, remember how real water acts. It flows down hill. So it will puddle at the bottom of a flower center, or hang from the lower tip of a petal or leaf.
Miniature Blue Flowers. The fluffy white balls were actually stamens cut from the center of a full-size artificial flower.
Miniature ferns and moss.
Miniature Tuberous Begonia, reminiscent of the colors of my mom’s beautiful begonia hanging plant.
Miniature Marigold.
Miniature Roses. To make a rose, I took one petal from a 1″ artificial rose, folded it in half and glued and rolled it up into a cone shape. The pointed tip of the cone was cut off and stuck down inside the top part of the cone to make center of the rose. Some cone tips are also used as the buds.
Placing the tiny bead droplets on the plants was a very contemplative task, like yoga or painting, with each moment crystallized and beautiful. No it was not tedious, it was restorative and full of light. All sparkled up.
“And the Lord shall guide thee continually, and satisfy thy soul in drought, and make fat thy bones: and thou shalt be like a watered garden, and like a spring of water, whose waters fail not.” Isaiah 58:11
18 Monday Mar 2013
About the size of a penny, they sprang from a package of Paperclay last year. I have no idea where they are now but fortunately I photographed them before they hopped away.
Five tiny bunnies, made of paperclay.
14 Saturday Apr 2012
Normally I don’t eat much of the Easter candy. One reason is it belongs to the boys. What kind of mother would I be if I took candy from my children’s baskets?
… um…
… licking my lips …
… never mind that question.
Anyway, I never touch the peeps. But this year we found a new peep – Chocolate Mousse dipped in Dark Chocolate.
Oh my, what a surprise! It tastes exactly like a cup of delicious hot chocolate, complete with melty little marshmallows floating on top! We only bought a couple not knowing if they would be any good. Seriously, I could eat a whole package of these.
Tonight’s dessert is – the last Chocolate Mousse Peep.
Delicious Chocolate Mousse Peep
All Sparkled Up 