Special Event: Love by Design – An Artful Charity Auction is Going On Now!

01 Friday Aug 2014

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Art and Crafting, DIY & Crafting, Glitter, Jewelry, Mixed Media, Soldering, Vintage

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artful charity auction, beaded necklace, Carrie Harney, Cheri Brorsen, crystal rondelle, Donald Brorsen, german glass glitter, handmade art, handmade art auction, lamp work bead, Love by design, Love By Design Auction, Swarovski Crystals, Terri Brush Art Camp, wire wrapped

I’m reposting this because the Love by Design Artful Charity Auction has begun and runs now through Sunday, August 3. Head on over to see all the pretty art that’s available and start placing some bids! I’m sorry to let you know that after the post below was originally created, Donald Brorsen lost his battle with cancer and now more than ever this family needs all the help that they can get to deal with the overwhelming medical bills that they now face.

Thanks for stopping by, friends.

xo,

Christine Barker

My friend, Carrie Harney, has a heart of gold and recently reached out to her creative friends to ask for our help for an Art Auction that will begin on Facebook on August 1. She shared that her friend, Cheri Brorsen and her beautiful family, are experiencing one of life’s most crushing trials. Tragically, Cheri’s husband, Donald, is fighting a battle with cancer and Cheri and her four children are facing a rough road ahead. Some of you may already know that I lost my mom to Leukemia as a very young girl and my heart just hurts for this family who will be experiencing the loss of a husband, son, father and friend to so many.

Cheri and Donald Brorsen

The Brorsen Children

Carrie asked if we could help her raise some money for her friend to help pay some of their medical bills. Do you ever have those moments in life where you feel like something you do can really make a difference? This was the call to action for me and my creative mind finally turned on, after a brief hiatus, and I started thinking of things I could make for the auction. A lot of my creative friends are involved and the items they have created are stunning! And, Terri Brush has even donated a spot in her amazing Art Camp!

Go to the Love By Design Auction Page and LIKE it NOW and check out some of the wonderful items that are going to be available. More handmade items will be added each day to give you a chance to see them and choose your favorites. The auction action begins on August 1 and you won’t want to miss it! Mark it on your calendar so you don’t forget!

I created a mermaid-inspired pink and silver wire-wrapped bead necklace with a soldered pendant featuring a Swarovski Crystal bedecked sea star floating in a sea of pink. Dangling from the pendant is a gorgeous pink lamp work bead atop a sparkling tassel of chains, beads and pearls.

Inside the miniature shadowbox pendant you can see a peek of silver German glass glitter. Above the pendant is a pink glass heart-shaped bead and some petite pearl beads and sparkling crystal rondelles.

The necklace also features vintage pearl colored beads, more delicate glass beads, and silver accents.

The pendant can be worn with the starfish facing out or the Life of the Sea side facing out, with its delicate sprinkling of silver German glass glitter.

Don’t forget to mark your calendar for the Love by Design auction, beginning on August 1 and LIKE the Facebook page now so you don’t miss out on any of the details!

Thanks so much for stopping by!

xo,

Christine Barker

Field Trip: Long Beach Antique Market

22 Tuesday Jul 2014

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Art and Crafting, DIY & Crafting, Field Trip, Jewelry, Mixed Media, Papercrafting, Vintage

≈ 2 Comments

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angels, atelier de campagne, crystal rondelles, french ledger, Julie Weller, Long Beach Antique Market, rosary chain, Tanya Peacock, tatted lace, trino

Last Sunday I took a field trip to the Long Beach Antique Market with my good friends, Julie Weller and Tanya Peacock.

We found some wonderful treasures and shared some giggles and I thought I’d show you what I brought home. Check out this eye candy. It makes me Swoon!

Some gorgeous beads and some metal angels and hearts.

Some sparkling rondelles filled with crystals and a piece of lace that reminded me of spiderwebs.

A unique rosary chain from Italy.

And dreamy, hand tatted lace.

But my favorite items that I brought home were 3 GIANT, and I mean HUGE, vintage ledgers from France that I bought from Trino at Atelier de Campagne. You can see the beautiful pages underneath my treasures. I can’t wait to use these ledgers for some collage work and mixed-media projects!

Thanks for stopping by!

xo,

Christine Barker

Special Event: Love by Design – An Artful Charity Auction

16 Wednesday Jul 2014

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Art and Crafting, DIY & Crafting, Glitter, Jewelry, Mixed Media, Soldering, Vintage

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Cheri and Donald Brorsen

The Brorsen Children

The necklace also features vintage pearl colored beads, more delicate glass beads, and silver accents.

The pendant can be worn with the starfish facing out or the Life of the Sea side facing out, with its delicate sprinkling of silver German glass glitter.

Don’t forget to mark your calendar for the Love by Design auction, beginning on August 1 and LIKE the Facebook page now so you don’t miss out on any of the details!

Thanks so much for stopping by!

xo,

Christine Barker

Flea Market: My first booth at Behind the Picket Fence

01 Tuesday Jul 2014

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Art and Crafting, DIY & Crafting, Field Trip, Jewelry, Mixed Media, Sewing, Soldering, Textiles, Vintage

≈ 13 Comments

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annette schwab, Behind the Picket Fence, burlap, burlap pillow, chenille, christine barker, costa mesa flea market, Deb Kennedy, diy booth, diy garland, Earlene, etsy, etsy shop, fabric garland, fancy pincushion, flea market, fruit picking bag, fruit picking sack, handpainted sign, Kim Kobayashi, orange county flea market, parasol, petticoat, Phil Barker, reproduction baby carriage, rose, scarlet calliope, steamer trunck, steamer trunk, Trevor Benavides, union flag, vintage baby carriage, vintage camera

It’s taken me years to feel brave enough to have my own booth at a flea market. I have a collection of things that I’ve been collecting for years, (plus a couple collections that I’m ready to call it quits with), all with the intention of selling them in my own personal boutique at a flea market. When I heard about the Behind the Picket Fence Marketplace, I just knew I had to give it a try. Well, first I thought about it and changed my mind a bunch of times, but in the end I made the leap and I’m so happy that I finally did it!

Thankfully I had a petit army of people to help me with my state of mind and artfully arranging my booth. Going into this event I was scared as could be, but knowing that my sweet husband and son would be there to help me set up and sell gave me some peace of mind. They were spectacular helpers, setting up the booth, doing the heavy lifting, greeting customers as they stopped by and handing out my business cards. Trevor even had a side business going selling some of the hundreds of burlap coffee bean bags that I had for sale. (If you want some, please just let me know! I have a few left!)

And I’m so thankful for my friend, Deb Kennedy, who’s an extraordinary Writer, Stylist, Designer and Speaker based out of Orange County, CA. When I put out the SOS for help to foof up my booth and give it some decorator savvy, she answered the call. I was petrified that I would set up the booth and it wouldn’t look like the picture that I had in my head. Deb came to the rescue and got right to work, rearranging items, placing them just right and using items in ways that I NEVER would have thought of. Plus, she took all of these beautiful photos!

Left to my own devices I would more than likely just put things out on the table but Deb knew just how to display things so that they would be shown to their best advantage. Like the vintage fruit picking sack, and the dress form, and the shabby chic tea pot with gloves.

I also had a selection of my handmade Union Flag aprons and pillows, burlap pillows, and fancy pincushions available for sale.

I created a variety of decor to give my booth my style so that people would know as soon as they saw it what I was all about. Several people asked if I would sell my fabric garland but I told them I’d have to charge them over $100 since it pretty much took me an entire day and too much fabric to create. I can’t sell it, it’s too pretty!

Burlap and rose decorations.

Petticoats on a parasol.

And, I hand painted a sign with my name to let people know who I was.

And finally, I had a photo booth to take pics of some willing shoppers as they stopped by.

All in all it was a wonderful day! I felt great because I finally conquered my fear of participating in a flea market, I cleared out some of my inventory and I got to spend the day with some wonderful people. It meant so much to me for people that I knew to stop by my booth because it was so nice to see familiar faces and when they gave me compliments about my booth I was over the moon! I think I’m ready for the next challenge now, I’ve got this!

Thanks so much for stopping by! I have some of these items and more listed in my Etsy shop if you are interested in purchasing them.

Also, this is my 125th post so I think that’s a reason to celebrate! I’ll be giving away one of my pin cushions to one lucky person who likes this post and leaves a comment here on the blog. Who wants to win?

xo,

Christine Barker

Design Team Call: Graphic 45 Design Team Call 2014

20 Thursday Feb 2014

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Art and Crafting, Cardmaking, Collage, Design Team Call, DIY & Crafting, Glitter, Jewelry, Mini Album, Mixed Media, Paper Sculpture, Papercrafting, Rubber Stamp, Rubber Stamp, Scrapbooking, Tags

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2013, Altered, announcement, antique, art, audition, craft, Crafting Design Team Call, Create, Design Team Call, diy, Family, graphic 45, Graphic 45 Design Team Call, Home, idea, mixed-media, scrapbook, scrapbook paper, vintage, We Want You

It’s that time again! Time for the Graphic 45 Design Team Call!

Terms and conditions are here DTcallG452014-2. For more details, check out their blog.

Good Luck, Friends!

xo,

Christine Barker

Swap: Vintage Inspired Valentine Charms

15 Saturday Feb 2014

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Art and Crafting, Christmas and Holidays, DIY & Crafting, Jewelry, Lovebug Creations, Soldering, Swap, Vintage

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Ann Hammes, Carol Lucero, Carrie Harney, charm swap, Debbi Wilcock, FIMO clay, friendship, hearts, Hope Ellington, Jeanine Stowe, Julie Weller, Linda Vinson, Lonnie Jenck, lori dams, love, LOveBug Creations, metal bezel, michelle duke, michelle hurtt, mixed media art, mixed-media, modeling clay, Nicole Goodwin, Pam Munns, polymer clay, Rochelle Gaukel, Rumple Ribbon, seam binding, soldered, swans, swap packaging, valentine, valentine swan, valentine swap, Vintage Charms, wire wrapped

For the third Valentine swap that I joined, I hosted a charm swap with sixteen participants.

With thoughts of love, friendship, and heart shaped everything in our minds, the girls in my mixed-media swap ended up with a beautiful collection of 16 charms to adorn them or their homes. Since there are so many girls with so many talents in this group I left the materials open to interpretation. The only firm rule is that each charm had to contain metal as a design element, either soldered, or metal bezel, or wire wrapped or something to give a cohesive look with soldered charms.

The main colors were pinks, white, silver, creams, and hints of muted Valentine colors. The size could range from 1″ all the way up to 3″ and this collection gave us all a nice combination of sizes to be used as a garland, charm bracelet, necklace pendants or as ornaments for a Valentine tree.

Pretty packaging was optional but these girls came through with some gorgeous and daintily wrapped presents!

I went for a new technique using FIMO polymer clay and I’m so happy with the way they turned out. This was my first time using it this way and I’m going to be using this technique again in the future.

Creating your own embellishments gives the artist so many different options than just purchasing store bought embellishments!

Here are all of mine all lined up with different ribbons on them. I just loved looking at all of them together! And don’t they look gorgeous with all of the different colors of Lovebug Creations Rumple Ribbon? You can find this beautiful and versatile ribbon in the Lovebug Creations online shop!

Here’s a detail shot so you can see the pretty swans. You probably know by now that swans are my latest infatuation. I found some adorable sterling silver heart head pins and added ballet pink pearls and a pink crystal onto them. I added some glass beads that reminded me of petite chandelier crystals and some tiny pearls.

Participants:

1. Michelle Duke
2. Carrie Reid Harney
3. Lonnie Jenck
4. Hope Habbe Ellington
5. Jeanine Stowe Weiss
6. Linda Vinson
7. Nicole Goodwin
8. Lori Stewart Dams
9. Pam Munns
10. Michelle Hurtt
11. Debbi Udall Wilcock
12. Carol Lucero
13. Ann Hammes
14. Rochelle Kretz Gaukel
15. Julie Gordon Weller
16. Christine Barker

Thank you so much for stopping by! I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing all of the Valentine inspiration that I’ve been steeped in. It’s been really wonderful. Tomorrow I’ll show you what all of the charms look like and you can adore them just like I have been!

xo,

Christine Barker

Want to see my other Valentine Posts?

Blog Hop: Loves Me, Loves Me Knot

Sweet: Pretty Jelly Jar with Lovebug Creations Ribbon

Swap: Queen of Hearts Valentine Swap

Swap: Precious Hearts Swap

Field Trip: Winter CHA 2014 Part 1

16 Thursday Jan 2014

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Art and Crafting, Cardmaking, Collage, DIY & Crafting, Field Trip, Glitter, Jewelry, Mini Album, Mixed Media, Papercrafting, Rubber Stamp, Rubber Stamp, Scrapbooking, Tags

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Artist Trading Blocks, arts and crafts, authentique, brenda walton, card making, card making trends, Carolyn Peeler, cha, CHA 2014, cha 2014 booth, cha winter, CHA winter 2014, craft, craft and hobby association, crafting, eileen hull, Everyday is a Holiday, Jenny and Aaron, Jenny Holiday, jo packham, Julie Weller, melissa frances, mixed-media, Mixed-Media Masterpieces with Jenny & Aaron, Petaloo, scrapbookimng, scrapbooking, scrapbooking trends, sizzix, Susan Shintaku, The sweet life, tim holtz, Where Women Cook

Living the creative life is an extraordinary experience but sometimes you have to work for it. Luckily for me, I only had to work a little bit (and had a lot of fun), in order to attend the Craft and Hobby Association Winter convention (CHA) this year. CHA is the big show where scrapbook store owners, designers and instructors get to see all of the new craft products from the manufacturers.

Thanks to one of my friends, I was able to work for a while in the Melissa Frances booth and the Petaloo booth. And, I also had time to walk the show floor and take pictures of the new products and say hello to friends.

Melissa Frances

I started my day in the Melissa Frances booth. I LOVE Melissa Frances products. Her product line includes gorgeous, vintage-inspired papers, trims, sparkling embellishments, miniature cloches and now chalkboard canvases. The time went by so quickly and I wish I’d been able to spend some time getting to know Carolyn Peeler. Luckily for me, Jenny and Aaron of Everyday is a Holiday were in the booth and we got to talk a little bit in between chatting with customers.

I’ve known Jenny and Aaron of “Everyday is a Holiday” since I met them at a creative event in 2011 and they’ve become two of my favorite people. Not only are they super talented, but they’re down to earth and have really big hearts. I’m so happy for them that despite having a tough year they’ve persevered and have created some awesome opportunities for themselves.

Recently, they released an amazing book, “Mixed-Media Masterpieces with Jenny & Aaron” which I ran out to buy as soon as it hit the shelves.

They also designed a line of hand-painted (vs created on a computer) product for Melissa Frances called The Sweet Life. I can’t wait until their scrapbook papers, journaling cards and other coordinating embellishments are in my local scrapbook store!

Are you ready for some Authentique Papers?

After my quick shift in the Melissa Frances booth I had a couple hours to walk around and see the new products from my favorite crafting companies. My first stop was at the Authentique Paper booth and they had some gorgeous papers and projects on display.

Next, I hit up the Sizzix booth.

Designer Eileen Hull has some wonderful new dies to create Artist Trading Blocks (like Artist Trading Cards, but with more dimension!).

And I always love to see what designer Tim Holtz has been working on. (And I figured out why I can’t find vintage trophy cups in vintage shops anymore! They’re all in Tim’s displays!)

Designer Brenda Walton has added 8 enchanting new dies to her collection, including flowers, leaves, a butterfly gift card, cupcake stands, a heart pendant, and also some textured impression embossing folders. I met Brenda for the first time at the French General Soiree on Sunday evening and she is a lovely, talented artist!

The latest news in the Sizzix booth is the line of incredible dies from Jo Packham, the editor of “Where Women Create” magazine and an amazing, modern renaissance woman. I had a chance to chat with her about her new line for Sizzix, “Where Women Cook”, on Sunday night at the French General Soiree. I’m excited to see how crafters will use her new dies to create gifts, favors, party supplies, and packaging for their home made baked goods.

Petaloo

Next, I had the opportunity to help CHA attendees create some beautiful Make and Takes in the Petaloo booth. If you haven’t checked out their beautiful blooms in your local scrapbooking store, you must! They have every size, shape and color you could ever want to embellish your projects! We started off making beautiful bracelets featuring gorgeous Petaloo silk rose petals and blooms and ended the day creating some gorgeous vintage-inspired mini valentines.

My friend, Julie Weller, worked the shift before me and our friend, Susan Shintaku, happened to visit the booth while we were both there.

Thank you so much for joining me for this field trip. I’ll have more pics to share soon!

xo,

Christine Barker

Secret Santa: Merry Christmas!

15 Sunday Dec 2013

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Art and Crafting, Christmas and Holidays, DIY & Crafting, Glitter, Jewelry, Lovebug Creations, Mixed Media, Swap, Vintage

≈ 11 Comments

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christmas decoration, christmas giraffe, giraffe, giraffe christmas decoration, glitter, LOveBug Creations, rhinestone, rhinestone jewelry, Rumple Ribbon, secret santa, secret santa swap, vintage, vintage rhinestone jewelry, vintage wreath

The Lovebug Creations Creative Team is starting Christmas celebrations a little bit early with a Secret Santa swap. Why wait for the 12 Days when we can start now? We each created a hand made gift for our Secret Santa Partner and bought them some gifts from their wish list. The best part is that the rules say that I’m allowed to show you what I made, but I can’t tell you who it’s for. But, I’ll bet that everyone on the Creative Team will know who my Secret Santa swap partner is right away!

From what I’ve heard, my swap partner loves this animal and loves the color pink as well. I hope she’ll be really surprised, in a happy doing-the-clap-dance way, with these sparkling creations. The mommy giraffe wears a crown made from vintage rhinestone jewelry.

Her wreath is vintage too, found at an estate sale a while back. It had some red glitter on it that I covered up with my secret recipe vintage faux snow. (I had to match the color and texture of the original vintage snow on the wreath!) A dab here and there covered up the glitter perfectly!

These little cuties are wearing wreaths adorned with beautiful Lovebug Creations Rumple Ribbon bows in Princess Party Pink.

After I was done putting the finishing touches on, I looked at these two and decided I don’t want to part with them. But I must, and I hope that my Secret Santa swap partner loves them! They’re all ready for a fancy Christmas party now!

Thank you so much for stopping by. Want to see what the other girls on the Creative Team have been creating? Stop by their blogs!

xo,

Christine Barker

PS: A great big thank you to my friend, Michelle Hurtt, for the helpful suggestions she gave me to help me create these cuties.

The Out Take photo:

Swap: Winter Wonderland Ornament Swap

05 Tuesday Nov 2013

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Art and Crafting, Christmas and Holidays, DIY & Crafting, Jewelry, Mixed Media, Soldering, Swap

≈ 2 Comments

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Alanna George, Antique Chic, christmas ornaments, christmas swap, Hope Ellington, Lonnie Jenck, lori dams, ornament swap, ornaments, Pam Munns, pinterest, Rochelle Gaukel, sally jean alexander, shabby chic, solder, soldered Christmas Ornament, vintage, vintage grandeur, Whatever Lola Wants Lola Gets, Winter Wonderland Ornament Swap

This year I’m hosting a swap for my friends who love to solder. I’m part of another Christmas swap and it closed before my friend, Pam Munns, could join, so we came up with some ideas for a swap for soldered ornaments with some of our friends we’ve met at the classes we’ve taken with Sally Jean Alexander. I’m so thrilled that not only did our Sally Jean friends join, but a coterie of other talented artists signed up to be in the swap as well!

It’s called Winter Wonderland and the guidelines are to create a soldered Christmas/Holiday ornament that is inspired by the beauty of winter. This leaves plenty of room for each artist to create an ornament inspired by their favorite part of winter and the Christmas holiday. I’m envisioning falling snowflakes, icicles on trees, adorable little woodland creatures hopping through the snow and all kinds of other gorgeous images.

I’m a big fan of vintage and shabby chic so I’m suggesting that all the artists create in a style that is somewhere between Antique Chic to Vintage Grandeur, with Antique Chic possibly being free spirited, lacey, made with linen, a little bit bohemian or a little bit primitive. Vintage Grandeur could be a little bit more dressy than Antique Chic, with chandelier crystals, rhinestones, and maybe a little bit of velvet or silk.

The color palette will consist of white, cream, silver and a hint of a muted winter color.

We have 20 talented ladies participating in this swap and I’ll be dividing us up into 2 groups so that we’ll make 10 ornaments each. The shape of the ornaments is wide open to whatever their hearts desire. There are so many shapes to choose from, like simple squares or circles, to house or dove shapes, vials and small perfume bottles and even stars or three dimensional shadow boxes or reliquaries.

The Ornaments are due to me by December 5 and then I’ll divide them up into the groups and mail them back out to all of the artists.

For inspiration I’ve been doing my research online and finding a lot of gorgeous soldered ornaments on Pinterest. I’ve created a board called Winter Wonderland to give myself some ideas about what shape I want and different colors and sizes.

exquisite-totally-white-vintage-christmas-ideas-15

exquisite-totally-white-vintage-christmas-ideas-28

exquisite-totally-white-vintage-christmas-ideas-34

Since it’s been so warm in Southern California it’s difficult to get in the mood for winter and Christmas so I found a great blog with pictures of beautiful shabby chic decorations to get me going.

Here are some of my artist friends in the Winter Wonderland Ornament Swap who have blogs, teach soldering or sell their soldered jewelry:

I’m excited that Rochelle Gaukel, of Whatever Lola Wants Lola Gets, will be joining us. As I was going through Pinterest I saw several of her beautiful pieces pinned to other people’s boards.

Lonnie Jenck is a sweetheart whom I met at Kim Caldwell’s glorious creative events. Lonnie teaches classes and is a wonderful artist.

Also joining us is the fabulous Lori Dams, who creates amazing jewelry! If you get to meet her, ask her about Hugh Jackson! And recycling! LOL

Alanna George is an artist I’ve never met in person but I feel lucky that I got to know her through the 12 Days of Christmas Ornament Swap that she hosted. She is a super versatile artist with talents in so many areas!

We also have Hope Ellington, an inspirational artist whom I’ve never met but we were in Alanna’s ornament swap together. It’s fun to meet new artists through swaps and get to know them via Facebook.

And I’ve volunteered to teach my friends, Julie and Jeanine, how to solder. I hope I’m able to give them the instruction and encouragement to create some beautiful ornaments!

I’m counting down the days until I get to see all of these beautiful ornaments start arriving at my house. In the meantime, I’m brainstorming ideas so I can create some delightful ornaments that will grace the trees of my talented friends!

Thank you so much for stopping by!

xo,

Christine Barker

Craft Fair: Psssst, I’m a craft fair virgin!

01 Friday Nov 2013

Posted by kryztyne2012 in Christmas and Holidays, DIY & Crafting, Field Trip, Jewelry, Mixed Media, Papercrafting, Sewing, Soldering

≈ 1 Comment

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arts and crafts, autism, benefit, Charity Wings Art Center, craft fair, crafting, crafting event, door prizes, entertainment, fundraiser, holiday craft fair, holidays, Mountain Shadows Outreach Services, music, san marcos, scrapbook royalty, silent auction, soldered jewelry, spa services, special event, stocking stuffers, union flag apron, vintage

Holiday Craft & Vendor Fair

Yes, it’s true. I’ve never, ever sold my handmade wares at a craft fair and it’s finally time for me to be brave and get myself out there. I’ll be setting up on November 16 for the Holiday Craft and Vendor Fair at the Charity Wings Art Center in San Marcos, CA to benefit Mountain Shadows Outreach Services and the Active Learning Center for Autism.

I’ll be bringing my soldered jewelry pieces, some Christmas stocking stuffers, some of my Union Flag aprons and some vintage surprises.

There will be 3 beautiful arts and craft projects to create that are perfect for all ages and levels. Each project will be a perfect handmade gift to give for the holiday season.

Plus, there will be a silent auction, door prizes, amazing vendors, food, entertainment, and spa services. Come on out for a great time and get creative while supporting a worthy cause!!!