Adventures in Gardening: Stevia (not Truvia)

On my forever quest to find healthy alternatives to refined sugar for the family and for my guests, I have definitely found one that I have fallen in love with over the past couple years after I grew it in my herb garden for the first time in 2011.  The name of the plant is Stevia, and it is very likely you have heard of it before since it is mentioned in commercials for a product called Truvia.  I am not recommending Truvia in any way. I have not used it. I have since purchased stevia packaged by Trader Joe's, and am pleased with the product, however, there is nothing like growing it in your own yard.

I have started to grow it in my butterfly garden section of my yard instead of the herb garden with even better results.

One very cool way to sweeten coffee calorie free is to add the dried leaves to the coffee beans in the grinder, or the crushed leaves to your coffee grounds.  Same goes for tea.  While I know it can be purchased in highly processed form from the grocery store under the name Truvia, I am always hesitant when something is processed to the point of unrecognizable.   I still have dried leaves, and have ordered the plants from Michigan Bulb and purchased from our favorite local nursery, Schwartz's Greenhouse.

Happy Gardening!

Faith

Branching Out

My favorite custom request this year...for so many reasons.

We're coming to the close of another year, and I wanted to once again thank my wonderful customers for their continued business. I also want to thank my family and friends for the love and support as we navigated the twists and turns that came with Jonathan's recovery from the accident. We are hopefully celebrating his last surgery which took place on the 23rd. It truly is a year I gladly leave behind, but not without the hard lessons learned. I can find appreciation for the growth this year. 

I think most of us will relate with one another when I say "Hasta la vista!" to 2016, though. 

So much has changed since the days of my small office/craft room.

Many changes are coming to Inspirations by Faith and Novel Adornment as we also begin our new journey as a family in 2017. This year, I finally took the plunge and will be incorporating and expanding- laying the groundwork for a much larger scale production than I ever thought possible over these past years. It was about time I realized it was time to fish or cut bait, as my business has all but taken over the basement and some portions of the main floor of our home. Looking for a home with a dedicated large studio and office space has been a bit surreal.

And I started an Instagram account...finally. 
(My account is not terribly interesting or appealing quite yet, but I have to start somewhere and work my way into it.) 

I also had the wonderful pleasure of meeting fellow sellers on Etsy and the absolutely delightful Vanessa Bertozzi from Etsy corporate (Brooklyn, NY) as we discussed Etsy benefits and challenges for the coming new year. Vanessa's insight was invaluable, and I genuinely wish many others had the same opportunity. I have always loved Etsy, but have been met with concerns over the past couple years about where I fit in the Etsy community as the business expands. After the discussions we had in that get together, I know I still have a place there to call home. I plan on doing a lot more blogging on some of the new venues and features we will be utilizing. 

One very happy moment that came along is reconnecting with a colleague and fellow artist from my designer/teacher days. That has been a great joy to me this year. I hope to soon be able to share more about our collaboration this January.

So cheers to the coming year, and to all the big changes it will bring!

Faith

Re-think Pressed Pennies

Okay, so if you have kidlets, you probably have a bunch of these little flattened pennies from travel, amusement parks, and field trips.  They are inexpensive, and even us stodgy adults love to watch the process of a penny being smashed and pressed into a pretty little souvenir. But then you get them home...well, then what?

Over the years I have looked at the stashes of these shiny little mementos, and wondered what the heck I was going to do with them.  Put them in a jar? Nope. Then the jar became the change dumping ground, and they became mixed together.  After that, they end up all over the house in various areas. My favorite irritation was finding them clunking away in the washing machine.

Many of you know that we usually take an annual road trip around the US.  We started collecting ornaments for each special location.  A few years back, I decided to use our smaller artificial tree (purchased for displaying my ornaments at local shows- remember when I did those???) to also display all of our travel ornaments and special handmade or colorful keepsake ornaments that don't match the silver, cream, and white decor of our living room tree. We set it up in the sunroom and surround it with all our fun Christmas creations.

That's when I had a flicker of inspiration....

So I shouted to the kids to find all the pressed pennies they could from our trips. I grabbed my thin hemp twine, and my crop-a-dile, and voila!

Just one more crop-a-dile miracle ;)

Merry Christmas!

Faith

Black Friday Weekend Sale

Inspirations by Faith & Novel Adornment will have store-wide sales. Coupon codes will be announced on Facebook on Thanksgiving day.

Happy Shopping!

Just a peek...

... at one of my "Drying Stations" at home. The reclaimed door is annually turned into my Christmas card holder during the holiday season.

(Tea-stained tags and hand-dyed vintage ribbon and embellished clothespins available at http://inspirationsbyfaith.com)

Have an inspired day! 

Young Maleficent Costume

Quick post today for those who have a daughter like mine who always comes up with the hardest to find or most unique characters to be. By no stretch of the imagination is Maleficent a unique costume this year- one of the reasons finding horns was close to impossible- they are sold out everywhere. Bekah, however, did not want the run-of-the-mill black costume set. She waned to be the young Maleficent, and was so clear on that point that she said that she would pick something else before going with the older version in black. So if you are looking for a quick link list on how to get this look before Halloween, here it is (having Amazon Prime is highly recommended):

• Dress (will be sewn to create an umpire waist dress, but could be  modified quickly without sewing)
• Horns (will be spray painted brown)
• Wings (brown fabric cape could be added to make them look more substantial)
• Tights 
• Ears (if you can't get them locally- remember the spirit gum if you don't have some at home)
• Sheet of faux leather to make pouch and jewelry (Joann Fabrics)
• Wood or glass beads for jewelry (Joann Fabrics)
• Brown shoes of your choice

I'll post the final product with photos and how I achieved the total look after Halloween, but hopefully this post will help another scrambling parent out there :)

Have an inspired day!

Preparing for Spring

Just wanted to quickly share my latest home decor project. It was very easy to do, and this is a very usable piece for me since I actually do need a place to dry herbs.  I love that this functions to help take up some of that blank space on the long wall in my dining room. 

I took a piece of reclaimed lumber, seven knobs and pulls from my ever-growing collection, and drilled spaced holes sized according to the knob's screw size and just twisted the knobs into place. Marc helped me put the french cleat (one of the best inventions ever) and finished project up. I place three framed art photographs that are special to our family above, and then done. 

Really looking forward to using it this year- and more than ready for this winter weather to be gone for good!

Have an inspired day!

(For those of you wondering why I didn't give the name of the photog who created the art photographs, it is per his request that he remain private :)  He does  not sell or distribute his work.)