The Road to Silver Bella

I am going to Silver Bella for the first time this year.
It's just so exciting, I can hardly stand it!

I started blogging last November, after seeing some amazing photographs in Artful Blogging magazine. Some of the featured blogs caught my imagination. I discovered Silver Bella 2008 from reading Heather, and Natasha's blogs. From there I discovered a whole slew of wonderful blogs and wonderful women. On my way to Silver Bella 2009 I am going to get to meet these lovely ladies: Lori, Mary, Beth and Karla. This is such a treat for me!


I feel really, really blessed. My daily life is richer because of the creative women whose blogs I visit, who visit my blog, who comment, who write such inspiring words and take such beautiful pictures that I am often in awe. I have discovered women who live near me and women who live on the other side of the globe. It is an amazing community and has probably been the biggest push in getting my antique shop open after years of saying I wanted to.


I am a terrible (or maybe I should say very good) procrastinator, so it feels like this is all last minute. But today I started in earnest. I made these button tags about 6 months ago. I always planned to sell them in a set of 4, but I only made 3. I do not know why I get 3/4 of the way into a project and then go off on another tangent. Today I finished the last pink one and made a complete set in turquoise. It was fun!


Last week when I was avoiding getting ready, I popped into a local antique mall. Mostly I go because one of the booths is fabulous! The packages of vintage paper and embellishments above are from her booth. I got to talking to the woman at the sales desk. I found out she is the owner of the booth I love so much. She found out I'm going to Silver Bella. Both of us were thrilled and I'm looking forward to spending more time with her.


I collected a whole bunch of cool things from the shop to put on my table at Vendor Night. -- vintage sewing items, millinery flowers, knitting books with great graphics & fun patterns too, monogrammed linens, etc.

I still need to put together vintage paper packets.

My newest Mini-Moo cards came last week.

A promotion tempted me to try something new. These are from photographs I took. The far right one is made up of things that have special meaning to me: a Shelley tea cup and a Whiting & Davis purse -- both from my mom; a reminder ("wish"), lace, buttons, millinery flowers, a compass to help me find my way and the pearls given to me by my husband when our daughter was born.

The cards are little, 1"x 2 3/4," and so much fun to share, specially cuz I designed them and the pictures and graphics mean something to me.

Flower Children

My grandma was an inveterate reader. My dad is too. As a little girl, instead of rounding up the neighbor kids to play school, I gathered up my books and started a library. My set of Winnie the Pooh has a penciled notation in childish handwriting "8 to 10." I must have thought that age would like it!

This book belonged to my grandma. I loved to look at it when I visited her, though I can tell she never made anyone wash their hands before handling it!

As you can see, this book has been lovingly read and used. It was published in 1910, so it's possible my grandma had it as a child. I don't remember if my brother or sister liked it, I just know it was very special to me. I was honored when grandma gave it to me when I had kids.

As a kid I really liked this page, with Jack Frost and a somewhat timid Daffodil.

All the flowers are depicted as children wearing their flower costume. The verses are cute or funny and on some of them grandma crossed out what was printed and added her own lines.

The single most depicted flower in this book is the rose, in its many varieties. When I was looking for an image for my shop and studio, already having the name Rose Brier, I was delighted to find a flower child that fit:

Sweet Briar Rose!

She's the front of my Moo Mini cards. If you don't know about moo cards, check their website out. It's interactive so you can see what your cards will look like. The mini cards are really small (1 1/4" x 2 3/4") and really fun !