Sylvia's Simple Shots

 This week new life appeared at the little pond.

I am sure they have been there all along but now that the mornings are quieter a few muskrats were feeding on bulrushes.

The morning sun was perfect lighting for these little fellows and I am sure their position where the sun arrives was well intentioned.

It was great to have continued photography interest at the pond.

I have been living with a pencil sharpener with a suction cup taped to the file cabinet.  When one which I could screw to the wall appeared at the thrift store it landed in my shopping basket.  The price was terrific.

It is 20 years older than the one I had so it dated back to the 1950's all metal with a pencil size selector dial on the front.

It works really well.

A friend came over for tea this week. Her last visit was in early August and the change in my place was remarkable.

I had left over desert from the house warming on Saturday so that was wonderful.  I chose the Ikea navy dishes for our visit.

The glass table set pitcher was great for water.

I have had the tray for a while and it sits under the serger desk.

It would slide in too far and it was hard to get out so I gave it a handle this week.

I checked my supply of knobs and found this plastic one tha would do nicely.  The bolt expects to have a drawer front thickness so I just added a piece of stiff foam to fill in the gap.

It sits on the floor right next to my sewing desk stool.

I have acquired a few Stampin Up products at the thrift stores in the last little while.

I was needing a "Thinking of You" Stamp for the IWin cards.  I was happy to return the rest of the stamps and keep the one I wanted for $2.

I picked up a SU Scallop Oval Punch in hopes that it matched the smooth oval punch I had at home.  It did. Another option for layering greetings on cards.

I picked up a sealed SU Oh so Ombre designer paper pad in 6x6 with some of the older colors that I have in card stock.

I headed to St. Albert for the fall art show which my aunt had some of her pieces in.

It was a great show with smaller pieces this year probably aiming for the Christmas gift giving shopping which is just around the corner.

Later, she indicated that sales were pretty good but because the pieces were smaller the total dollar amount was down.

We had lunch at Cajun House.

I also picked up boxes which have been stored at her house since 2022.  Now I have to got through all of them.  I am grateful she had room to spare for my stuff.

On my way to St. Albert yesterday I saw a sign on the highway for a quilt show.  I checked it out when I got home.

My neighbour aunt and I headed there on Saturday.

It was great to spend some time in this medium.  I am not a follow the pattern quilter but it was nice to learn more about AccuQuilt.  Interesting mystery challenge quilts. There was a vendor that dyed her own fabric which was great.

Several quilts combined the sewing of a quilt with the hand stitching of applique.  Those were my favorite one. 

I guess in crochet doily blanket will be something like that. 

Sylvia's Simple Shots

The Canada Geese are gathering in large numbers.  It is the time of year.  We have been experiencing wonderful weather for October.

The geese were communicating, honking and flying over head.  I expect they are in fields feeding on harvest leftovers and I was grateful to see so many on Saturday morning.

This is the largest pond at the Heritage Hills Wetlands.  I did a large walk because I walked along all 3 ponds that morning.

The weather was perfect and I had such a good time.  The sun rose of course as I was out there and it affected my photos.

Sunrise and sunset are getting closer together.

I finished this book earlier this week.  The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards was an interesting read.

There are two story lines for a set of twins - Paul stayed with his parents David and Norah.  David a doctor gave away his daughter because she had Down Syndrome.  This decision made this couple absolutely crazy.  I just quit reading that story line about half way through the book.

Phoebe was given to the David's nurse, Caroline to be delivered to an institution for disabled persons.  In the 1960s this was common.  She could not leave the baby girl in this very sad and desperate institution. The night the baby born Caroline meets her future husband and makes a move to ensure that Phoebe survives and thrives.  This story line was so much more positive and uplifting.

When I quit the first story line and when to the last chapter and read back a few chapters to get the end of the story.  Saved the book for me.

I received a bowl full of beautiful cherry tomatoes from my aunt.  I am so grateful to have these delicious fruit to eat for the next few days.  I have a bunch more green ones which will ripen over the next couple weeks.

I roasted some the other day that were the last of the ones I had bought from the grocery store.  They burst and were delicious.  I ate them with the pizza that was in the oven at the same time.

Harvest is such an amazing thing.

I finally got one of these vintage pencil sharpeners.  We had one of these when I was at home and going to school.  With 8 kids in school you can bet it got a lot of use.  It was rescued when Mom and Dad left the house in 2015. 

I found this one at the thrift store the other day and check out the price of $2.  Once it got a real good cleaning I discovered that the suction cup on the bottom still works as designed.

I tested it out before I took it home and it will be appreciated for the next long while.  I use colored pencils mostly because I use mechanical pencils for writing.

Very grateful that it showed up after looking for about 4 years.

Every Step she Takes - K. L. Armstrong was the book I finished in the last couple of days.

I did finish this one but it was another story which was pretty crazy.  The murder mystery was interesting and compelling.

It was not for me but I am sure it works for others out there.

A beautiful fall shot of the yellow leaves in this season of autumn.

The challenge for Flickr's Macro Mondays is "Open". This was a great challenge and allowed a wide variety of subjects.  The shot on the right is an open container of leads for mechanical pencils.  You can see my submission on my Photostream (SMDPics).

Have a great week!

How To: Wax Crayon Paper

I'm thinking about Earth Day (April 22 2014) ideas already.  I have been collecting wax crayons given away at restaurants when children are at the table.  This happens regularly for me so I decided to recycle/reuse them rather than them being thrown in the garbage.  There are some great ideas out there. Being a card maker I wanted something I could use in my regular projects. I did some research and here's my process.

1) Cover your work space with a couple of layers of scrap paper.
2) Strip the paper from the crayons.
3) Use a pencil sharpener to create wax shavings
4) Lay your shavings on wax paper in whatever manner you want.  Mixing the colors will create colors like orange, green, and purple.
5) Cover your shavings with another piece of wax paper.
6) Add a couple of layers scrap paper.
7) Heat with an iron designated for crafts on medium setting.
8) Lift scrap paper to reveal your wax crayon paper.

Next time I will use more wax crayon.  Trying to align yellow in the center for flowers was not worth it. Check tomorrow to see what I made with my paper.