Happy Valentine’s Day!

14 Tuesday Feb 2017

Posted by Julia Monroe in allsparkledup, art, crafts, encouragement, flowers, home decor, photography, projects, sewing, sparkling, Uncategorized, Valentine's Day

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All Sparkled Up, allsparkledup, allsparkledupdesign, hearts, photography, Valentine's Day

If you follow me on Instagram, AllSparkledUpDesign, you know I’m posting A Month of Hearts. Today is Day 14 and there are 14 days of hearts to go! Here are the hearts I’ve posted so far. Make sure you check instagram so you can read all the captions that go with these photos. Love to you all!

Pink Lace candy box

Candle-lit heart

Real, edible, miniature chocolates.

Mercury glass heart and pearls.

Beaded Heart, neat and tidy

Beaded Heart, wild and unkempt

Circuitry Heart

Welded Heart

Tiny Raggedy Ann and Andy

Tiny Raggedy Ann with her ILY heart

Vintage Valentines

Ribbon Flower velvet candy box.

Silk Ribbon Embroidered heart box.

Stone and Crystal Heart.

Pink Ribbon Flowers.

14 Happy Valentine’s Day!

Two swans heart.

The tiniest book I ever made – Blue Flowers

14 Friday Oct 2016

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, allsparkledup, art, books, crafts, flowers, handmade books, miniature, painting

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art, art books, book arts, bookmaking, crafts, miniatures, painting, water color

This tiny book, less than a quarter inch square, is titled Blue Flowers.

The tiniest book I ever made was titled Blue Flowers.

The tiniest book I ever made was titled “Blue Flowers” and included tiny paintings and descriptions of blue flowers. In order to qualify for “micro mini” status, it had to be under 1/4″ square.

I shaved the blue suede as thin as possible so the edges could be folded with less bulk.

I think I made 7 copies and traded them with book making friends. I have one copy but don’t remember where the other copies went. Each book with blue suede cover and gilded page edges was tucked inside a tiny blue flower.

The text was printed using a laser printer. When the pages were cut apart from the sheet of printer paper, I had to be careful not a single breeze blew over my worktable since I couldn’t see the text and would have to use a magnifying glass to put them all back in order again. I was glad when I had all the pages stitched together!

Each book had a headband made of silk ribbon. The gold ink used to gild the edges was sticky so I used an exacto knife to carefully cut the pages apart so they wouldn’t stick as the ink dried.

Tiny book, with blue suede cover, text and water color paintings of blue flowers.

I made the paintings on each page using a magnifying glass and a brush that had only 3 hairs in it.

Blue Flowers – a micro mini book with descriptions and water colors of blue flowers

The paintings were so fun to make! Some day I hope to make a tiny book about Pink Flowers. But that will have to happen soon before my eyesight ages even more.

Roses peeking in the window!

15 Friday May 2015

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, encouragement, flowers, gardening, God, Inspirational, nature

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All Sparkled Up, allsparkledup, encouragement, flowers, gardening, God, inspiration, nature, New Dawn, roses, window

I can’t count the number of friends whose lives are really complicated right now. I’m included in that number. So many troubles are weighing heavy on our hearts. But through it all, God is still there and still in charge.

This year, he gave me a little surprise again. Several weeks ago, I noticed New Dawn rose buds in the window!

The New Dawn rose has grown all the way up to my second story kitchen window again.

New Dawn rose buds peek in the kitchen window.

My kitchen window is on the second floor and I don’t have planters in the windows. The patio isn’t finished, the paint is peeling, lots of things are falling apart.

The patio is still unfinished.

Due to disability, I had to let a lot of things go, such as pruning and training the New Dawn rose bush. Just when it was getting to a good age to work with, my spine was collapsing so there were a half dozen years that disappeared.

The New Dawn rose bush is an untrained mess, tangled up with the honeysuckle bush.

Those were the thorn years. Lots of tangles and brambles.

We have to be careful walking down the stairs because the railing is lined with large, sharp thorns.

Even then, good things keep growing. Never forget that… GOOD THINGS KEEP GROWING.

Look how far that rose has grown! All the way to the window!

All the way up to my kitchen window, the rose bush reached.

The roses didn’t care that the paint was peeling.

Does God know where we are? Does he know our dark space? Can he see our need for beauty and goodness?

Yes, God is aware. He knows what we need. And all those little buds lined up in my window to say Good Things Keep Growing.

The roses are blooming now. But the weight of them is pulling the vine over.

I put three nails and a loose wire up to hold the roses up so I can see them from the kitchen again.

Roses in the window!

And how fitting that the rose is called New Dawn. Even without a window box of nourishing dirt, 20 feet from the ground, never stopping, the roses are peeking in my window to remind me Good Things Keep Growing.

Good things keep growing.

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. Is 58:11

Today it rained

14 Tuesday Oct 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in flowers, gardening, nature, photography, water

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figs, gardening, nature, photography, rain, rainy day

Little figs are growing on the new growth.

But there are bare stems where the little figs dropped too soon.

Fungus is growing on the fireside stumps

Fungus on the fireside stumps.

Pink

07 Tuesday Oct 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, color, family, flowers, grandkids, nature, photography, sparkling

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All Sparkled Up, color, flowers, grandkids, nature, photography, photos, pink, pink things

Pink.

Pink rose petals

Pink Lego perfume bottle

Pink Dragonwing Begonia

Pink icing

Pink bubble wands

Pink happiness

Pink roses

Pink bubbles

Pink building blocks

Pink lace

Pink flowers

Pink beach sweetness

I’m glad it’s still summer

04 Thursday Sep 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in flowers, gardening

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begonia, flowers, gardening, heirloom tomatoes, plants, summer, vinca

It’s September 4th but I’m rejoicing in the summer cicadas, the sun’s heat on my skin, the tomatoes that are still trying.

Dragon Wing Begonia

Trailing Vinca

Out of four vigourously growing Heirloom tomatoes, only one bore fruit, much to our dismay. But the flavor was so spectacular that we will try again next year.

New growth is appearing at the base of one of the Heirloom tomatoes.

Table centerpiece using four mugs and a vintage cake pedestal

03 Wednesday Sep 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in flowers, home decor, party, tea time

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centerpiece, dessert tea, floral arrangement, flowers, Inc, mugs, pedestal, Rosanna, table, table setting, tablescape

That was a long subject. Ha! I had a dessert tea a couple months ago and this was the centerpiece. I used four beautiful mugs from Rosanna, Inc and placed them on a vintage dessert pedestal that was my mom’s. It was so easy to arrange the flowers in the mugs! I’ll be doing this again. After the event, I put away the pedestal but kept the flowers on the table a while. They were so pretty with the elegant gold china designs.

Rosanna’s Luxe Moderne Mugs make the perfect “vase” for the flower arrangement.

On my worktable – artificial flowers

21 Friday Mar 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in All Sparkled Up, crafts, family, flowers, home, home decor, Inspirational, On my Worktable, Uncategorized

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artificial flowers, crafts, family, flower arranging, flowers, home decor, On my worktable, spring arrangements

Today my worktable was full of flowers for the spring arrangements. The bins have been in the living room for over a week but I finally had time today. It’s always a pleasure to arrange the flowers, even though they are the same ones I’ve used for years. At the end of a season, I pull all the flowers out of the vases and sort them by color in bins, then they go to the attic. It’s good to start fresh each year so I mix and match the flowers to suit the season and mood.

The arrangement for the foyer. I’ll probably add a little more at the base. It looks a bit too tight but I’m crazy over the color.

The bare brances were in the corner through winter, strung with lights and crystal snowflakes just to add brightness to the room.

The same bare branches now share the space with artificial dogwood and greens. The lights were taken off the branches and placed in the vase for ambience.

I love the new arrangements! They make me happy. =)

Not in the photos: son’s twin size mattress on the floor in the living room because we have to tear out the downstairs bathroom and completely redo it due to a major leak.
Not in the photos: the flat screen tv right in front of the large dogwood arrangement in the corner.
Not in the photos: tears shed because another one of our children moved out last week and we’re all missing him and wishing him well and cheering for him in his new job in another state.

Two of my sons. Noah on the left moved south last weekend. We miss him! Very glad for the job opportunity though.

We all have a choice on what to focus on. I choose to focus on what’s good and bright and beautiful and sparkling in life. You can have brightness if you choose. Sometimes it takes a lot of work, like clearing a garden of weeds. You have to yank out bad thoughts and deliberately hack at unwanted vines. But it’s possible and totally worth it.
Finally, brethren, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things. Ph 4:8

The arrangement for the living room table. The velvet-petal roses are showing their age but they are still beautiful.

Bowl Roses

19 Wednesday Feb 2014

Posted by Julia Monroe in flowers, home decor

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bowl roses, cut flowers, flowers, gardening, roses

That is what the roses become when they wilt too much for a bouquet.
This rose is too far gone to revive.

The rose is wilting.

All the roses in this photo are from the same bouquet. The wilted roses in the vase on the right are the original length.
The roses on the left had the stems trimmed once and fresh water. The roses in the bowl were cut off the stems right under the calyx just as they started to bend over but before they wilted. Overnight in the bowl of water, they perked up. Amazing how all these roses were from the same bouquet.

All the roses are from the same bouquet but they received different treatment.

This photo was taken several years ago.

The roses are cut just under the calyx and placed in water in a bowl. The bottom of the short stem touches the bottom of the bowl and the roses are resting in the water.

Here are my Valentine roses from this year. They were grocery store roses and weren’t fresh to begin with. But yesterday they started to droop so I cut them short and placed them in water. Today several have revived and I removed the brown outer petals from the roses that never opened.

The brown petals were plucked from the roses and they were placed in a bowl full of water. They still look lovely days later.

Bowl Roses. They still look nice days later.

These roses are exquisite, shaded in delicate shell and baby pink. I was surprised he remembered my favorite colors! So sweet. The Bowl Roses look beautiful on the work table.