Happy New Year!

And now let us welcome the New Year,

full of things that have never been

                                                                   Rainer Maria Rilke

Now that Christmas has passed,

I can show you a project that I worked on to give as a gift.

But first,

my son has a unique way of giving me a stash of embroidery floss for a present.

whether it be Mother's day, a birthday

or Christmas,

He always finds pretty containers, and then stuffs them full

of new skeins of embroidery floss........

"my sewing basket runneth over"

now for the project.........most of you are familiar

with Hallmark store's Maxine and her little dog Floyd?

My friend/sister-in-law has always loved Maxine's

character and sarcastic wittiness.  

I always try to make her some kind of unique item......something that 

no store has and that no one else will probably ever have. So 

I  decided to make a Maxine doll.  I carefully sculpted her head

from oven bake clay and after it was cured, I painted  and styled as

best I could.

I also sculpted her hands

her legs/feet with shoes.

I made her body soft and stuffed in a garment that looks

like something Maxine would wear

I then sculpted her little dog Floyd out of oven bake clay.

As most of you know.......she also wears bunny house shoes,

which I hand sewed 

and made to fit on her feet.

My friend loves the doll boxes I create......so.....

I found a very pretty shaped box

and on one side, created a kitchen setting , complete

with table, chair, tea pot, tea cup, a food bowl for Floyd, 

an oven baked clay pie

and a window scene

the other side of the box, I made a place to hold her wardrobe

and other little accessories I made for her

My friend/sister-in-law was delighted.....

as I hoped she would be.

After all of the laughter was over, she told me

that our local Hallmark store is closing........

as many others have recently done.

It is a shame to see these types of stores

fade away.

So now she has a memory of something from that

"era" to make her smile.

I hope this finds that you all had a happy holiday time

with friends and family and that you 

have wonderful hopes for the new year to come!

Wishing you a very merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas dear friends!  Stop by my cooking blog at this link for a recipe for a wonderful cake for Christmas!

                                                                        LINK"

                                                           Cranberry Layer Cake

Snowflakes are one of nature's most fragile things,

but just look what they can do when they stick together.

Vesta M. Kelly