Spring Has Sprung

Spring has sprung in the Bayou City. How do I know? Well, for starters pots are overflowing with pansies.

And it was 82 degrees yesterday so my vegetable and herb garden is finally in (about a month late).

Even our bottle tree is starting to bloom.

So what better time to update my circle flowers. First, I added a center button with a bold "spring" on it from my gigantic dictionary.

Then I got out my fancy-dancy new Silhouette Cameo machine and tried my hand at my first cutting project. It may be my new addiction, although I may just love it because it gives me another excuse to smell my scrapbook paper. 

After a few test patterns, I cut this from a piece of variegated scrapbook paper.

And now I have this...

And now you know where the flowers is.

Circle Work

I didn't put up very many Christmas decorations this year. That doesn't mean that I had my house put back together any earlier than I normally do. 

Remember these guys? 

They finally came down yesterday. On the 33rd day of Christmas my true love gave to me...

Don't judge me.

One of the reasons it took me so long to take down the wreaths is this guy. Remember him? 

Well, he went in the attic a long time ago, but he haunts my dreams anyway. In a good way. I think. 

I'm hooked on those little circles. I love the way the book circles set off the colored circles and visa versa. 

So instead of putting up the rest of my Christmas decorations, I might have got a teensy bit obsessed with those circles.

Because I covered this apple.

And then I made this teal flower...

and I liked it so much, I made a brown one, too.

There is something calming about taking all those kitschy pictures from the RDCBs and punching them into nice pretty circles. 

There's a quill for the center and then another between layers to give the flowers some dimension. 

Before I knew what was happening, January was almost gone. I looked at the calendar and realized that February was less than a week away and I still had Christmas wreaths on my front door, so yesterday I finally took them down. 

But I kept looking at that center. The one with all the Christmas stuff on it...

...and I covered it with circles.

Four layers of circles. 

The colored ones came from a hardback atlas I bought awhile back. There is something calming about taking Venezuela, the Indian Ocean, and parts of Canada and punching them into nice pretty circles.

I hung the wreath near one of my bookshelves.

"Straighten up!" I heard one of the books whisper. "The lady is obviously crazy and you don't want to end up like that guy."

Supper Club Crafting

Tonight was our annual Supper Club Christmas Hayride. Thank goodness it is only annual. I am stuffed to the gills. It is a progressive dinner each year, with appetizers at one house, dinner at the next, and dessert at the last--and all of my friends can cook! Not a bad morsel had all night.

The real fun part is in between houses we take a hayride through the neighborhood and look at the lights, like these perennial favorites. In this one every window has a different scene and the front yard is stuffed with fun.

This guy hangs lights from the tall, tall pine trees that grace his front yard. (You can see how high these go. That's the top of his roof near the bottom of the picture.) He works for the same company that I do. I asked him once how he gets those lights up that high and he said that it was a great secret. So everyone continues to try to guess. My latest theory is a bow and arrow, but I heard someone tonight posit tennis racquets. Until we figure it out, I will just enjoy them and their mystery.

We supper clubbers usually give each other little gifts. Here's what I gave this year.

Yes, definitely a Pinterest-y Christmas.

I wrote about making trees like this before, but I think I've gotten better with practice.

First of all, I've learned where the glue goes, so now the layers pop. I also alternated the book pages with left over scrapbook paper to good effect, I think.And I added a loop at the top in case someone wants to hang it.

The inspiration for the Christmas ball came from one of my favorite blogs, All Things Paper. I took that idea and added circles of book pages, because, I think we all know that everything goes better with book pages.

 (And seriously, check out these artichoke lights by the same artist, Allison Patrick. Love those!)

Obviously I'm still on a turquoise kick because the ball and the tree both match my latest book.

How did I make that happen? Well, it's a great secret, but I can guarantee you that there were no tennis racquets involved.