Life @ RuffHaven

Have you read any good books lately?

Today is National Book Lovers Day.

Here are a few of mine.

What's on your bookshelf?

Tuesday, Tea and Twelve Photos

Hello Dear Friends,

This morning I slept in....as in ....slept til noon kind of sleeping in.
The lifeguard allows this especially after I put in a long day outside
with mowing weeding and digging in the dirt.

When I realized it was Tuesday I grabbed the mug that
my dear sweet Lifeguard gave to me last week,
made a cup of tea and sat down to catch up on my collage.

I am trying to combine my efforts to keep up with Daisy Yellow's 61 Daily Paper Prompts and Elizabeth's T stands for Tuesday weekly link up. So far it seems to be working.

The Tea

The tea I chose today is a

Holiday Tea from

Harney & Sons. I buy it at

Barnes and Noble when

it is available in November.
I love this tea so I buy
three tins to last all year.
I also love love love their

Hot Cinnamon Spice tea....

but I ran out of that. boo.

The photo on the right

shows the tiny black tea

and the orange peel and
teeny teeny tiny safflower.

The Art

The prompt I am working on is
#5 - Linear.
I think I am a day or two behind. I'll try to catch up. I was a bit shaky so I didn't draw a lot of lines....

just enough to appease the prompt gods..... ......I hope.

The Mug

I love how he surprises me with small tokens of affection.

Although I could not be Dog Mother of the Year without him.

I hope your Tuesday is a very very happy one.

Thanks for visiting.

Marianne

T stands for Tuesday is a new weekly blog link up party

hosted by Bleubeard and Elizabeth

<----- click on this link to find out more.

Ho Ho Holy Moly... it's time for holiday sewing

I can't think of a better way to kick-start the
Holiday Sewing Season than a Quilters Blog Hop?

Madame Samm and Carol have the spirit and energy
to round us all up and put us in one spot.
Thanks to both of them for all their hard work.

The most difficult part of these hops is to actually come up with a good idea.

.... just one good idea.

I was pondering this and the lifeguard said....

"Make something practical and useful"

Duh !

Sometimes men can be so smart.

So what could I make that will be used a lot during the holidays?

A bag.

A very BIG bag.

A Mondo Bag.

A bag you can fit all your stuff in.

A bag big enough to haul all your stuff home.

I picked up this pattern last year at a quilt show in Florida.

It is by QuiltSmart and has preprinted fusible interfacing.

You can't get any easier than that right?

This bag took 3 hours to whip up and it would have been even

quicker if I had used precut strips.

But I didn't have any of those so I cut my own strips.

I quilted "in the ditch" because ~~I didn't want the ....~~
oh heck....because it's easy to stitch in the ditch...
who am I trying to kid.
I ran out of time again.
sheeeesh.
One of these days I am going to finish way way ahead of time.

I have these two quilt tops to finish before December too.

Thanks for stopping by for a look.
No giveaway this time but scroll to the bottom of this post for
news about my Huge giveaway coming soon.

Enjoy the hop.

The list of hoppers today....

August 5

Cherry’s Prairie Primitives

Scraps of Life

Words & Stitches

Blue Heron Quilts

More Stars in Comanche

Handmade by Mama

Julie from Quilted Works (on my blog)

In Stitches and Seams

Scrapbook ChickADoodle

Jane’s Quilting

Beaquilter

Life@RuffHaven

and the entire list.....
Here

Happy Sewing !
Happy Ho Ho Ho - ing !

Oh ....one more thing
I will be having a HUGE giveaway on August 10th !
There are several ways to follow this blog
listed in my sidebar.
So follow me now and come back to see what I have planned.
It's a big one.
5 big boxes full of goodies for 5 happy winners.
Yes there will be one huge box just for quilters.
(holiday fabric, patterns, gift cards, notions)
I did a giveaway like this a few years ago and it was so much fun.
Please plan to come back on the 10th
to enter.

Thanks for stopping by
Marianne

also linking to Sew Many Ways ... So Darn Crafty

August - Breakfast - Rainbow

I am going to participate in August Break this month.

But I am not going to be taking a break from my blog.

Instead I am going to use the prompts to try to establish a
new routine to be a more consistent blogger.
I will also try to remember to post to instagram.

the first prompt is
Breakfast

A few of you know I recently
lost a lot of weight.

I won't go into all the details now but
I will share my daily breakfast with you.

Chocolate Protein Shake

Spinach

two dashes of Tabasco

30 drops of artichoke extract

20 drops of cinnamon

1/4 tsp of salt

all whirled up in a blender

I am also participating in

Tammy's 61 Daily Paper Prompts

over at Daisy Yellow.

I am going to create one collage and try to use

all the prompts on one piece.
The first prompt is
Rainbow

If it gets too difficult or cluttered I might have to split it in two after 30 days.We'll see ... these two daily prompt lists should help keep my creative juices flowing through the dog days of summer.

and ....don't forget....

I am also planning a Huge Giveaway this month.

Previously on PaperPlay@Ruffhaven

Dear Readers

I am in the process of transferring posts from PaperPlay to this blog.

If this post is a repeat for you....thank you for reading my blog all these years.

If this post is new for you....I hope you enjoy it and find a bit of inspiration here.

A few years ago I enjoyed participating in group projects. many of those were making Chunky Books. This was where each player made several identical pages, usually 4"x4", one for each player. The pages were then mailed to the hostess ( or host ), who collated and bound them, and mailed each book back to the players. Is that clear as mud?

I do miss Chunky Books and wonder if anyone is still hosting Chunky projects.
This is one of the pages I had made for Creative Cards Swaps in 2007. The subject was "Whimsy" The hostess was Sweet Pea and I can't for the life of me remember her real name.... sorry.... I think it was Kathy.

I started with an idea and a sketch.

Stamping swirls on the corners and smudging the edges with gold paint

I stamped the clear bottle on acetate with Staz-On ink.

When it was completely dry I cut out all the bottles.

The fairy was a rub-on purchased at Recollections in Columbia MD. All of the Recollection stores have closed. I do miss them, but my pocket book is happy that they are gone. I left off her foot so she would fit into the bottle. Little details like this are important you know.

Here we have all the pieces in place. All that's left is to add the bottle. I did that with glue along the edges. Than add the lady standing outside the bottle, another rub-on.

Here we have 33 pages all set to go.

Working in stages , the process really doesn't take long at all.

A bow and a tag and off they go in the mail.

(see how the fairy's foot would have been a problem if I had left it on)

In return I received a book with 22 pages....hhmmmmm.....I wonder what happened to the other ten players. This was often a problem with group projects. Some people would drop out without notice. I must admit I have had to drop out of one or two myself...It happens.

Here is the finished book with my page .