Civil War

This is what happens when critters in the garden take sides

This Weekend is the Civil War game between the Oregon State Beavers and the Oregon Ducks.  Our store is duing our part to promote the game and our holiday party by giving away daffodil and tulip bulbs.  The elf represents the Little brother beaver team and the Gnome represents the Big brother duck team.  Personally, I can't decide who I'm supporting.  On one hand, it would be awesome to see the Ducks remain undefeated, however I did attend OSU and it would be thrilling to see the Beavers defeat the No. 2 team in the Nation.  As long as both teams play well I think it will be an exciting game to watch.

I Heart Gingies

This Christmas I love snowmen and Gingies!  What are gingies you ask?  Gingerbread men of course!  I don't know why I started calling them gingies, but I can't stop. My friends tell me it sounds like a dirty word.  I disagree, I think it captures the essence of the gingerbread man. I love them so much I am making us all gingie stockings for Christmas.  I also put them on sale on my etsy site along with my chickadee stockings so everyone can have a fun stocking this year.   Go to http://www.etsy.com/shop/bunnygirl7 to see my designs.  Happy Holidays!

This is the first stocking I made.  I cut the gingie out of felt and hand stitched him on.  He has button eyes and a big loving heart.

These two stockings are so cute together

My family of mini gingies!

I love this material.  I bought it a few years ago but keep buying more because I think it is so cute.  I've found tons of uses for it so far.  I hope they don't stop making it.  I don't know what I'd do without my gingies.

Favorite Time of the Year

November through December is my favorite time of year.  I love the cold weather, the fresh apple cider, the snow, Christmas songs and all the Christmas cheer.  I especially love working at the garden center this year.  I spend three weeks preparing for the Holiday season.  Its a lot of work involved but it always looks so beautiful.  This year I went overboard making the fireplace display and decorating the greenhouse.  Here are some of the highlights of what I've been working on at the store.   Pictured above is  the greenhouse when you first walk through the doors.  You walk through a lit archway of garland and at either side are rows of poinsettias and at the end is a poinsettia tree raised above the "snow".

 Looking down the aisle the beautiful Poinsettias really stand out over a blanket of buffalo snow.

Rows and rows of poinsettias line the greenhouse.  They come in tons of colors I didn't even know existed.

We also hung garland and Christmas lights above the poinsettias this year.  It looks beautiful at night when all the other lights are off.

I hung empty hanging baskets filled wit presents above the poinsettias.  They add a perfect touch of the Holidays to the greenhouse.

My favoirte poinsettia...the Shimmer surprise.

The original owner of the store, Walt, owns a 1925 model T.  We had to push it 4 blocks down the street and then backed it into the back of the greenhouse.  We had Santa Walt come down last weekend to take pictures with families and people with pets in front of the model T and inside the store in front of the fireplace.

This is one of our photos we used in our store newsletter to let our customers know about Santa Walt coming to our store.

Here He is with the Schmidt's Girls

This is inside the store in front of the fireplace.  We had beautiful angel and reindeer statues on display. (I really want to put the bunnies in the sleigh...)

The Schmidt's Crew in front of the fireplace.  This is another photo we used in our newsletter.

First Snow Fall

 It's 8:45 am in Corvallis.  The temp. is 28 degrees, and the ground is covered in the season's first snow fall and a lot of ice on the road.  The bird feeders were extremely crowded this morning as everyone tried to get their fill of sunflower seeds and suet. 

 Walking out of my house and into the court yard

 As I was walking to work there were several puddles filled with leaves that had iced over with just the maple leaf stems sticking in the air

 Someone was out with their owner for an early morning walk

 Approaching work.  The Christmas lights were still twinkling in the snow

Looking inside the greenhouse.  It looks toasty and festive in there

Halloween Update

I updated my photos of my Peacock Costume from Halloween.  Check out my updated page of Easy (and Cheap) Halloween Peacock Costume

A sweater for Buster

 I spent my weekend working on an autumn sweater for my mom's chiuaua Buster.  My first attempt at a sweater turned out much too small for even a chiuaua. So this is my second sweater.  I embellished this one with a felt acorn and leaf. Through the process of knitting different sizes of sweaters I discovered that Cocoa puff is the same size as Buster, so I used him as my first model.  (He was not a fan).

He looks so cute.  I'm going to have to make him and Oreo Christmas sweaters before our family photo!

Stockings

I'm already looking towards Christmas and have started my holiday crafts.  A few weekends ago my friend Amy was in town and we went to the fabric store to buy supplies to make our own stockings.  I accidentally bought enough fabric to make 32 stockings (not sure how that happened).  So I have lots of ideas of how to use the fabric.  So far I made eight stockings (four of each kind) and a matching tree skirt. It was hard to take a picture of the skirt but I will work on it.

This is what we ended up with...tons of fabric for both stockings and pajamas, 15 patterns, countless buttons and patches....and all we came in the store for was enough fabric to make 4 stockings. We got a little out of control.

But I made cute stockings to decorate the store fireplace (see my blog about my step by step guide on how to build a fireplace)

Close up of the chickadee detail