SPRING - EARTH HOUR - FLOWERS - OH MY.......

Oh my aching back.......
I just spent the entire morning working in the garden.  Pruning roses, raking dead stuff from last year, cutting back pesky vines that want to take over the world......... 
It's a lot of work but it will have it's rewards once everything starts blooming.
I already have a few daffodils blooming and the hyacinths and tulips are coming up fast.

So...........   Just to remind you.
TONIGHT is when I'm going to give away a set of my hand made flowers.
Right after Earth Hour.
Yes, Earth Hour is tonight.........
So right after I turn on the computer again I will be giving them away.
Send me an e-mail to YARASAVICH@AOL.COM with "Spring Flowers" as the subject line and I'll enter your name to win these pretty flowers.

HAPPY SPRING!!!!! = And a RAK...........

Ah, Spring..........   Who doesn't LOVE Spring????   A time for new beginnings.  A time for all things beautiful.  I am so looking forward to watching my garden starting to bloom with all the flowers that my Mother had planted in our garden.  She was the green thumb of the family.  She and my grandfather.

Me, well........  Not so much........   But I try.  I HAVE TO TRY......  I can not let the garden go completely.  Ofcourse it will never be like it was when my Mother cared for it and nurtured it.  I doubt that I will ever win trophies like she did.  But still the blooms will come and they will bring joy to anyone who takes the time to enjoy them...........

It is with great sadness that I now have to face a big change in the garden.  There is a tree in our back yard that has been there as long as I can remember.  It was a mature tree when we bought the house in 1975. (The picture of the tree in full bloom is from a Polaroid which was probably taken in the 80's or maybe late 70's)  This poor tree is now looking very, very, very pitiful........   The second picture is how the tree looked this morning.  Several branches broke under the weight of the huge snow we recently had and I am afraid it will never be the same again.  The third picture is of the tree after most of the broken branches were cut off.........
I will wait till later this year to see if anything blooms and will make a decision at the end of the year to see if I must cut it down completely.


But we must move on........  IT IS SPRING!!!!!!!!!!!  A time for new beginning.....  A time for joy......  A time for beauty.........  





Oh........   Did I mention there would be a RAK????

Lately I've been seeing just about everyone making hand made flowers for their scrapbooks and art projects.  Some have me absolutely speecless!!!
I'd love to share with you the flowers I've been making the last couple of weeks.
These little Needlepoint On Plastic Canvas flowers may not be anything fancy but I think they are very cute.  They can ofcourse be dressed up with the addition of pearls or buttons or glitter or anything else your heard desires.  I've just been too preoccupied in makeing the basic flower to go any further.
Please drop by my shop on ArtFire to see the flowers I have up for sale:  http://www.artfire.com/users/MYCREATIVEROSEGARDEN

So in honor of the first day of Spring, I'd love to share a few of these flowers with you.
Just send me an E-mail to Yarasavich@AOL.com with "SPRING FLOWERS" as the subject line and I will put your name into a basket.  On March 27th I'll pick one winner and they will receive the flowers shown in this picture. 

What are you waiting for?????
Send me an E-mail so maybe you can win these cute flowers.


HAPPY SPRING!!!!!!!


....

THE SHOP IS OPEN

I finally started an account with Artfire.  (Thanks Laura for telling me about this site)

PLEASE CLICK ON THE LINK AT THE TOP RIGHT CORNER OF MY BLOG.
Or just go here: http://www.artfire.com/users/MYCREATIVEROSEGARDEN

Okay - So far it is nothing to be impressed with I guess but all good things start with a single step, right???

Hey, and how do you like my new banner???  Thank you again Laura for helping me out.

If anyone needs a good - make that GREAT - web designer, contact Laura:
http://www.laurahartwigdesign.com/



Now I've just got to take some more pictures of my crafts and my craft supplies and start posting, posting, posting......... 
And hopefully SELLING, SELLING, SELLING!!!!
WISH ME LUCK...............






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AS SEEN ON TV

QVC - HSN - Late Nite Infomercials...........

I remember yelling at my Mom because she was constantly watching QVC and HSN. Between her and the lady a few houses down, the UPS Man was on our block practically every day.....

Okay, Okay..... So the apple does not fall far from the tree........
Yeah, I admit it. I've been known to buy stuff (a whole lot of stuff) purely on impulse.

Today I was going through some boxes and look what I found: The GT Express 101 machine.


When the heck did I buy this thing??????
WHY the heck did I buy this thing????????????????



I have no clue but here it is.
Now what do I do with it???????

Maybe I'll get some refridgerated cinnamon rolls, bake them in my handy dandy machine and watch QVC..........

No...... Wait.... Maybe I'd just better get back to cleaning.
Lord knows what I'll find next!!!!!!!!!!

:0)





























....

JULIE & JULIA

I recently signed up for Netflix & the other night we watched Julie & Julia.
As we started watching the movie I jumped up, ran to the kitchen and grabbed two books.
Ran back and yelled "LOOK!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Yup - There they were. Two cookbooks that I've had for at least 20 years. Where did they come from????? I have no clue.......... I just know that they've been in my kitchen for years and I don't think I've used one recipe from either one.
Bob & Bobby looked at me like I was crazy but I thought it was funny that

I had not one but two Julia Childs cookbooks and didn't even know it until the books in the movie started to look awfully familiar.... So there we were: The two guys, the dog, the bird and me with my two books watching Julie & Julia.

The movie itself was cute. I'm pretty sure I enjoyed it more than the men did but they put up with me anyway.......
(Bob thought it was going to be about them meeting & cooking together.... I think I've forced him to watch the Food Network a little too much.........)

I was inspired by Julie. A young girl living in a not so perfect apartment over a pizza shop in Brooklyn who works in a boring job by day, who has a problem with finishing any project she starts, who likes to cook but is no expert. She starts a blog about cooking. Taking one full year and over 500 recipes and going through each one until she's done.

I was also inspired by Julia. A not so young woman who seriously adores food......
At the suggestion of her husband she takes some cooking classes and discovers that food is truly her passion. It must be amazing to find something that you are so passionate about, that you are good at, AND it is something that people admire you for.

Unfortunately after the movie the cookbooks were once again put away in the kitchen to collect more dust......... The movie was returned to Netflix....... and I still have no desire to try any of Julia's recipes...
But in the end, I still think it's funny I have those books. I still think it's great that Julie was able to start & finish a project that she was interested in. And ofcourse I am truly amazed by Julia Childs who in her 40's discovered her passion and ended up changing the world of cooking.......

Hey, if those two did what they did then maybe there is still hope for this mid-40's chick who is bored out of her mind and is desperate to find something to be passionate about..........
BUT WHAT???????????
What is there that I LOVE to do?????
Something that I am truly good at?????????
Something that I am passionate about???????????
I have no clue..........

Sigh.............

Oh well...... Maybe in time I will find that one thing that I will LOVE to do.
In the mean time there are so many things that I LIKE to do.......
So instead of just waiting around for "Love" I'd better stop wasting time and enjoy every single second of "Like" cause life is way too short............


MAY YOU ALL FIND YOUR PASSION.......
But until you find it, have a good time looking...........


:0)




............

Mom = Monk.........

A friend told me a while ago he wanted to run away, become a Monk and bake bread..........

That's exactly how I feel right now. I want to run away and bake bread.......

My son once told me I was like Monk. You know - Monk from T.V.

I forgot why he told me that but what ever the situation was, I could not argue with him because I had been caught - I was probably doing something stupid that seemed to mean something to me when it was happening but it was just something trivial to the rest of the world......

I am by no means trying to make light of the fact that some people really do have serious OCD but I definitely do think that I have a serious problem........
Call it OCD, call it Monk-ism, call it just plain crazy - What ever you want to call it I definitely do have a problem.......

I confess - I am probably one of the most disorganized people you will ever meet.
I am late for everything and I lose just about anything........

But then there are these crazy times - Like today - Where I have this crazy need to organize things........ I will spend hours lining up all the boxes and cans in my pantry. Yes, I know it is a waste of time and I know it will not stay like that but for a brief time things are in order and I know where things belong and somehow at least one little part of my life is in order.........

So here I am now with enough pasta, tuna fish, Chef-Boyardee and Chicken Broth to last a year.

Why do I have this much??? Well, cause it was on sale ofcourse....... Gotta stock up when it's on sale - That is when you do it - It's like an unwritten law in my little mind...... And then for a brief time at least, all that stuff has to be nicely lined up - And all is well in the world........

Now if I could just get everything else in my life to be all nicely lined up so I could find things and everything else could be all nicey, nicey in neat little piles so I would not have to think so much about how to make things work out.

I know the answer is to take things one step at a time. If you start at one end of the house - or one part of your life - and work your way through to the end, one day you will find yourself "done" and you can sit back and look at your house - or your life - and say "It is perfect".

Problem is I just cant figure out where to start...... So I start here and there and everywhere and absolutely nothing gets "perfect" and I end up getting frustrated and just stop trying..........

Last year I got motivated....... I felt like I really wanted to change........ I felt pretty damn good...

Then I got a little off track....... Took a brief sidetrip from the journey.........

Now I know I need to get back to trying to reach my goals.........

I still dont know where to start..... I still dont know how long the journey will be........

And I really, really hate trying to do this by myself........

But for now........... For now at least I have all my pasta, tuna fish & chicken broth all lined up.

Hey - It's a start............

Maybe when the rest of the kitchen is organized, I'll bake some bread.

Maybe when the rest of my life is organized, I'll even invite some friends over and we can laugh about me ever wanting to run away to become a Monk...........

...........................

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!

Happy New Year everyone..... Today is 01-01-10.

As many of you know, I've spent quite a bit of time recently thinking and planning and plotting all the things that the New Year would bring........ How I was going to change so many things in my life......
Yes, there is even A LIST.........

It's not exactly a New Years Resolution List.... It's actually more than that.

You see, for me this is soooooooooo much more than just a "New Year" - Or at least I had planned on making it so much more.......

I'm not going to bore you with details..... I just did not want to let the day go by without a post for the new year.......

I guess the whole thing can be summed up by showing you pictures from Mary Engelbreit.
I LOVE MARY ENGELBREIT!!!!

The first picture is how I had planned on ringing in the new year......

Sort of Super Hero-ish. The Queen with her magic List...... All sorts of great things written on there - All sorts of things to transform her life into something marvelous......

The second picture is of of The Queen as a little girl making a long list of all the things she wants..... - Yes, ofcourse it is a loooooooooooooooong list.........

But in the end she realizes that all the stuff on her list were not what Christmas was all about.

The third picture is more realistic.......

Yup - It's the Queen sitting in her big comfy chair with her bunny slippers sipping a drink.
Unfortunately I dont have bunny slippers (and yes, even at this age I would wear them if I did....) and the drink that I am sipping is just tea to wash down the medicine to hopefully help me get over this dreaded cold that I have.......... - I swear I feel like my head is going to burst that is how congestide I am!!!

So the Queen Mother sits and looks at the previous sides of her......... The little girl queen who wants everything......... The young girl queen promissing herself that she will change into this new person - The person who will surely be HAPPY.........

In the end - The Queen Mother sits there realizing she is too damn old for this shit..........

Yes - I will keep having lists of things that I want - But I will not be sad if I dont have it all.
Yes - I will keep having lists of things that I want to change about myself - But I will also be happy with who I am and will cherish the people who love me this way.........

So...........

This is the many sides of me............

What about YOU???????
Will you be there for me as my friend??????? Will you be there to encourage me to try to make changes that will make me feel better but will still love me if I'm a little (lot) bitchy???

I know many of you will......... There are so many dear friends that I know I can count on.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE..........

I still say it's going to be an amazing year........

(The Queen has spoken................ LOL)

:0)

......