I Love New Ornaments

and I love old ornaments.

A little over 20 years ago I started collecting Victorian ornaments and gradually turned our tree into a Victorian tree.  I love the dolls, the birds, the poinsettias, lace, pearls -- I love all of it and I look forward to decorating every year.

I don't like the new pre-lit tree as much as our old tree that finally hit the curb two years ago.  The ornaments seemed to fit it so much better.  But Beau likes this tree better because the furniture doesn't have to be moved around too much and, most important of all, his bed does not have to be moved at all.  He does not do well with change.

Each year I buy a new ornament.  This year, I visited the Henry Plant museum for the Victorian Christmas Stroll and stopped into the gift shop after I completed the Christmas Mouse Hunt.  Yes, you read it correctly. One of the highlights of touring 14 rooms decorated to the hilt with gorgeous trees adorned with ornaments of every description was to try to spot little white mice hidden throughout the museum.  I made a collage of all my mice pictures.  Click on it to see the enlarged version.

I bought several new ornaments and a little white mouse.

They blended perfectly with my older ornaments.  I also took a few pictures of them as well.

Too many to post all so I made a collage of them as well.

I posted a photo of the tree in my last blog entry.  When I was a kid still believing in Santa Claus, I never saw the tree until Christmas morning.  After I stopped believing in Santa Clause I got to help with the decorating and I loved it.  Dad was so creative.  We had holly trees gilded with gold paint, flocked trees, color wheel silver trees (I hated those) and all manner of evergreens.  No two trees were the same.

That was great then.  Today I prefer the comfort of the old and familiar along with just a touch of the new.

Merry Christmas, everyone.

The weather outside is frightful...

Well, not frightful, exactly.  But we do have a cold snap in place.  Good soup weather.  In fact, after a long day, we had the end of the vegetable beef soup I fixed last week along with grilled cheese and bacon sandwiches.

The tree is finally up.

And, the pup's bed

is exactly where it was before we began today.  He walked around with a really worried look on his face all day long because I had moved it to an area just inside the front door.  I think he thought it might be going out with the next person to ring the doorbell.  He seemed very relieved to see it go back in place.

He's not to crazy about having the ceramic puppies and "Schultz" so close, but he finally relaxed....

Really relaxed.

Happy puppy again.  Exhausted by all the supervising he had to do today to be sure we didn't forget who rules the roost around here.

Mystery Solved

Update to the citrus tree discovery:

We have gotten about a dozen tangerines from our new tree and they are delicious!  From everything I have read, the first crop on a new tree is small and sometimes kind of sour.  Ours is a small crop at high branches on the tree, but they are flavorful.

To be honest, I have to say I am very glad the seeds turned out to be tangerines and not mango, papaya or some other citrus.

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The mystery citrus tree we have in the backyard is.....

a TANGERINE tree!

Too high to get a good picture but we can see that the fruit that is turning orange is also flattening out and taking the unique shape of a tangerine.

I am doing a happy dance as the tangerine is my favorite citrus fruit.

Just hoping the taste is good.....

Paper Flowers for the "Crafts" at Fun & Games & Crafts Day

It has been a long time since I made any paper flowers -- and even then it was with Kleenex tissues -- I think it was for our Junior-Senior Prom in 1963 or 1964.  Whatever one it was that we made what seemed like millions of white and pink carnations.  I think the theme was April in Paris or something.  Anyway, they transformed the gym, I do remember that.

Yesterday, I spent some time with my young friend, Holly, who showed me how to do the paper rose made with old book pages from books that were so old and damaged that they were headed to the recycle bin. Today, I played around with pink crepe paper and created the other rose.  I will be making templates for petals for other flowers and doing a dry run on dahlias, carnations and several other types between now and October 29 when we hold our fundraiser at the Heritage Museum.

I used to love to play Mexican Train dominoes on Fun & Games Day. But, two years ago, we realized that some of our loyal members were buying a ticket and not coming because they didn't play games of any description and had no interest in doing so.  So we added crafts to the fun.   They bring their needlework if they want -- or they join us at the craft tables for whatever we are doing.

This year we will be making flowers like the ones above that will be placed in florist foam in brightly colored buckets on the tables at our fashion show on March 14, 2015.  Our guests will be able to pull one to take home  as a table favor.

There will be several more crafts workshops before March so all our members have a chance to participate if they wish.  I love it when we can do crafts together with a purpose in mind.

That's part of the "fun" in "fun"draising!

I took this the morning that I picked the pineapple.  And I have to agree with everyone else I know who has grown one.  They taste nothing like the ones in the grocery store.  Ripening on the plant makes a world of difference.

It is long gone now, of course.   Still haven't planted the top we saved, but will do so.  The original plant produced two pineapple plants and the second one is still growing.  No flower yet.  This one stunted the growth of the other and it didn't really take off until this one was about done.

Guess What?!!!!!

As my daddy used to say,

"It's perculated to decent sufficiency!"

Of course, he was talking about his morning coffee.

Not I.

THIS is what I'M talking about......

It's turning YELLOW!

And while I was out on the lanai doing my happy dance, I took a picture of the little stick my husband planted early this spring.  This summer's tropical weather has really caused it to leaf out.  No flowers yet, but she's just a baby plumeria.

I didn't go out in the yard to take pictures of the bigger plumeria trees but did get a shot of one with a big clump of flowers that was close to the screen.  They are all doing wonderfully well this summer.

And, Beau....yes, he's doing great, too.  

But he still hates my camera and won't look at me unless I'm holding a treat.  He's completely well again and we're so grateful to Dr. Borecky and the great guys and gals at Day and Evening Pet Clinic in Palm Harbor.  They are absolutely the best!

New Beau and New Painting

Our Beau's skin is all cleared up and he is perky and acting like a puppy once more!  So happy!

Magnolia
Watercolor on Paper

And, I'm getting the hang of the watercolor pencils!

Yes!

Happy, happy, happy!

Finally!

Yes. Finally!

Finally, I have gotten to the point where I understand how watercolor pencils work.  They are so different from painting with regular water color, yet also quite different from regular colored pencils.  As a result, I have been spending hours completely frustrated trying to teach myself this medium.  I bought a couple of books, checked a few out of the library and finally found an old VHS tape on eBay that helped a lot.

I have used up a whole pad of watercolor paper learning the different techniques and finally have a painting that I don't completely want to trash.  I really don't want to keep it, either, because I think it is boring. Very boring.  But I was finally able to use all the different watercolor pencil techniques in a painting without royally screwing it up.

So... Ta Dah!  I am posting a picture of "Sherri's Boring Little Landscape", done completely in watercolor pencil on 8X10 140# watercolor paper.

"Sherri's Boring Little Landscape"
Watercolor on Paper

Next one will be more interesting subject matter, I hope.

But I'm not promising anything.

Poor Beau

I have come to the conclusion that I need to pop a valium whenever I go with Butch and Beau to Beau's vet.

Yesterday, after several weeks of trying to deal with Beau's allergies, we gave up and made an appointment with Dr. Borecky.

We got there at 10:30.

At 11:49 we got back into the car several hundred dollars poorer and all of us were basket cases.

Beau got probed, tested, stuck and suffered various other indignities to which he took great exception.  During this time, I could not even look at what they were doing and my stomach started to churn.  It brought back some memories of visits to the pediatrician with my babies "way back when."

I could never be a nurse.  That may be why I have such great admiration for that profession.  I have also decided I could never be a Vet or a vet tech.

Beau slept most of the day, got up long enough to eat (his appetite has been unaffected by his skin condition), ignored us and went back to sleep.  We were not on his list of good friends at that point.  I'm sure he felt a sense of betrayal.

So this morning, he ate his breakfast, went out to do his business in the backyard after refusing his leash for a walk with Butch.

We tried a bribe again this morning to get him to forgive us.  Didn't work last night, but maybe....

Eureka!

A milkbone in the hand is bound to get a puppy back in line!

Eventually.

My Pineapple has gone wild

Since the pineapple started blooming a couple of months ago, we have had new plants spring from this one.

 The pineapple is still growing.  New growth is to the right of the fruit.

I got Butch to hold back a few leaves to show the other new growth.  

There are a total of four new plants.  I am really not sure what to do with this but will wait til I pluck the fruit before I do anything with them.

As though the pineapple babies weren't enough, Butch planted a sucker from one of the tomato plants in with my pineapple.  He does not remember which plant it came from.

It may have been off this Better Boy in the topsy turvy planter.  He got rid of that planter yesterday and planted it in the ground.  I took this just before he did it.

Or it could have been off this plant.  I think it is the Cherokee Purple.  But it may be another Better Boy...or Big Boy.  Why won't he label these plants?

We have gotten two tomatoes so far -- both were Cherokee Purples.  Both were delicious.

And I have two more plants on the lanai right now.  This new flowery one and the Ponytail Palm I have had for years.

 Oh, and the Knockout Rose next to one of our plumeria trees has not been overgrown yet. ;-)

It does need dead heading. 

Won't happen today, though.

Blooms, Blooms and More Blooms

Time for an update on our flora and fauna.  I had a terrible time trying to narrow pictures down for this post.  The plumeria trees areso beautiful this year!

I'll start with the pictures of the newest one and then the HUGE trees a little stick like that grows into.

New Stick Planted this Spring

Now for the BIG ones!

Blooms -- they are beautiful and they smell even better than they look.

The flower bracts form first and then the blooms start to unfurl:

They end up on the ground where they make a pretty display against the grass.

And they end up in a dish on my kitchen counter.