"Old" Friends

Among the more than 200 caring members of
TEAMEPE, there are several vintage sellers including me. Although we do not claim the artistic talents and creative juices of our handmade sellers, we do cultivate the knowledge required to search out, identify, age, and price the treasures we sell.

(Thanx KarmicBook for the use of your "OLD FRIENDS" print!)

Here are a few interesting listings from some of my favorites:

opendoorstudio





ProsperosBookshelf



goldnuggets




5gardenias

terabg

tmariepenrose

Antiqueish

The Other Bella

Bella came to live with us several months ago, soon after we had lost our black German shepherd, Heidi, to diabetes and blindness. We had come to love the breed, and so would settle for nothing less. It took some extensive dog shopping, but we finally found a white German shepherd that we felt would fill the gap. Since Bella weighed in at almost 60lbs. and could put her front paws on my shoulders in jubilation, I never quite accepted the fact she was just a puppy. It didn't take long, though, for that to become apparent. All she wanted to do was play!! With me, with my husband, with the cats, and with anyone who happened to stop by. The first time she saw snow, she raced around the yard snapping at the flakes and sliding down the hills. Anything left lying around the yard was fair game to Bella; a bucket, a rag, a newspaper. She soon began gathering her "toys" into a pile on the hill behind the house. EVERYTHING was a game to her...and still is.

Now that she will be a year old next month, she has become an integral part of our family. She is often too rambunctious, always unruly, sometimes troublesome, but through it all, full of unconditional love. I've had one dog or another through most of my life and suspect I like it that way...

Hickory Haven

Way back in 1998 when I bought my first computer, long before the days of blogs, my son taught me html and how to make a webpage. I titled it Hickory Haven since I live in a rural community called Hickory Valley. I started out with a bio and moved on to my flowers, my pond (which he and I built), and eventually, my travels, including our unforgettable Australia trip in 2000. It now has 25-30 pages, lots of photos, and a couple of slideshow/photo albums. My only regret is that the earliest pages include photos taken before I owned a digital camera. Recently I added a page telling about my Etsy shop, and last night I included a blurb about my team, Etsy Project Embrace or TEAMEPE.

Now that I'm a blogger and have discovered the ease of an html editor which does most of the work for you, I wonder at all the effort it took to complete these pages. Looking back, though, I feel an immense sense of accomplishment, far greater than that I feel when google helps me add a new post to my blog.

Just Jewelry

Among the almost 200 members of TEAMEPE are lots of wonderful jewelry artisans who donate a portion of their sales to ACS. Donations to date are just under $7,000! Here are some samples from just a few of them:




GlitzGlitter






Nyblaque





visionquest





envejewelry






WildWomanJewelry

kathiroussel




KneeDeepOriginals




3squares

Click on their shop name to see more of their creations!!

Back From the Tropics

I returned Tues. night from six days in Cancun where the weather was in the 80s and sunny. Now two days later, I am preparing for a winter snow/ice storm. What's up with that?

The first morning in Mexico, I looked out of my hotel window just in time to see the sun coming up over the ocean. There's nothing more beautiful...

I opened the window and let the balmy breezes lure me awake. I was anxious to head downstairs and enjoy the sand and surf. I spent my childhood on the beach and now that I live far from the ocean, I never seem to get enough of it.

Unfortunately, it was quite windy and the waves were more than I felt I could deal with, so I took advantage of the several pools just feet from ocean. Many hours were spent lounging and reading and sunning and relaxing, and swimming when the urge arose. All in all, it was everything a vacation should be.





These are views of the beach and pools from our eighth floor window.







As wonderful as it is to get away now and then, coming home is wonderful as well. Earlier this evening, I looked out my front door and saw this spectacular winter sunset.

Friends and Family

Not only am I proud to have an Etsy shop, but several of my friends and my daughters also have shops. I think it's time to share my favorites from theirs.

My eldest daughter has two shops, fisheye and fishlegs. The first showcases her lovely upcycled handmade items and the other, the vintage finds she loves to share.




My youngest daughter has a shop, gatonegro, where she upcycles
t-shirts, belts and thrift shop fabrics into great bags and totes.



My middle daughter's shop, aurorafedora, is temporarily in limbo while she reorganizes her life. Here's her totally awesome blog: the hellhole diaries

Since becoming a part of EtsyProjectEmbrace, I have made SO many new friends!! The following are just my favorites from a few of them:

moonovermaize


maclancy


adornbyamysingley


dancingintherains


creativelytangled


I plan to include many more of my TEAMEPE friends in future posts.

Snow Wonder

Here in middle Tennessee, we don't get a lot of snow, but when we do, it's well worth the wait. It snowed much of yesterday and is flurrying this morning. This is the view I see when I stand on my front porch. I live in an old farmhouse on a wooded mountainside with a beautiful valley spread out in front of me.
As a rule, the snow we get in a morning is usually gone by afternoon, but since the temperature today is hovering around 17°, that will likely not be the case.

I wouldn't want to live where there was NO snow, but perhaps this is enough. :)