A little bit of fashion

 Parisian Rose Pillowcase dress by CharmingNecessities













The Claire wristlet by handsfullcreations












Black and White Silk Charmeuse tichel by SowersOfHope




















Summer Blues Scarf by donnasdesigns





















Handmade Cheer Wavy Quarter Style Apron by Beegrl88



















Vernian Lace Choker and Floral Brooch Set by honeybeebungalow




Posted by Kelly @ The Handmaden

I Heart You!!!

Sheteam shows some love and gives you a few more choices for your Valentine's Shopping


Love Beach Photo - A Dusty Frame



Itty Bitty Heart Banner - Sugar Yarn



Little Barn of Love - TerrBear



Hand Painted Reversible Heart Pendant - Amyma

Posted By Sonja

Megan - Spice Of Life - Shares Her Artistic Journey

Megan has graciously extended a discount to our readers. Find details below.

Section 1 Tell Us About Your Crafting
1. How long have you been crafting?

Forever, but jewelry specifically since late 2007. I was blessed in elementary school to have a phenominal art teacher. Mrs. Runnels let us experience everything
from coiling, glazing and firing pottery - to batiking fabric and carving our own lino cuts.
The broad discovery of techniques in grade school led to a life long love of art. I arrived at creating jewelry in a roundabout way. Photography was my primary artistic outlet, and became even more a focus on the birth of my first child. Scrapbooking entered the scene, and not content to just slap the pictures on the page, each one had to have handmade embellishments, too. At that time, wire embellishments were just gaining in popularity - it was so pretty on the page it made sense to turn it into jewelry as well. I've always loved working with color - and the amazing array of gemstones available results in an almost endless palette to work with.

2. Do you have childhood memories of a crafting success or failure?

When I was in first grade I won first place in the Indianapolis 500
Art Festival for an oil crayon drawing of an iris. I wore a super
frilly lavender dress loaded with ruffles to accept my big blue ribbon
on stage at the Childrens' Museum of Indianapolis. Let's just say my
fashion sense has changed since then...but I still love Irises!
Hand Forged Sterling Hammered Heart Necklace in Pink Gems


3. Do you have your own workspace?

I'm supposed to, but to my husband's chagrin I have something jewelry related in almost every room of the house...I fuse on the stove top in the kitchen, heat
harden my argentium in the oven, tumble pieces in the bathroom, ship
from the dining room...the only place there probably isn't something
jewelry related is in the kids' rooms - and if there is something
there, they need to put it back.

5. What inspires you to create new pieces?
Most of my pieces start with a focal stone and evolve organically from there. I'm constantly trying new techniques and wanting to learn better methods to create
the multitude of ideas I have floating around in my head. Every once
in a while I'll see a striking color combination or shapes and
patterns in nature that I try to capture in a piece.

Section 2 Tell Us About Your Homeschooling Life

1. Are you currently home schooling?
If so how many and what ages/grades? I'm currently homeschooling three children, ages 10, 7 and 6. We work to abilities instead of grade levels.

2. What challenges do you face when combining homeschooling and home
business?
Time management - finding enough time in every day to
conquer school, household tasks, and business issues is a constant
battle. Most days - the housework loses....

3. What advantage do you think you have by combining homeschooling and
home business?
If we weren't homeschooling, I probably would not have
survived the crazy rush on personalized family tree necklaces I
received between Thanksgiving and Christmas - Since we homeschool our
schedule can be more flexible and relaxed during peak business times.
We take December off, but are still going strong through July, so it
all works out.

4. Do you have a favorite curriculum or style of teaching? We're
unschoolers/ interest based learners - I just sent my oldest off to
grandma's with a vintage camera and a basic lesson on using it - we'll
get the film developed and talk about color theory, the science and
chemistry of photography, the technical aspects of things like
aperture and depth of field, with charts and math rolled in.

Section 3 Tell Us More About Yourself
1. What is your education background?
I have a BA in Psychology, which I completed the year after my son was born.

2. Did you do other work before you began selling your handmade arts
or crafts?
I've been home with the kids since my first child was born - other than a very brief stint as a scrapbook consultant (it was good for discounted supllies even if I didn't sell anything to anyone else!) I'm blessed to say no.
Handwoven Sterling Silver Hoop Earrings

3. Why did you choose to start your home business?
After my husband's second job loss in less than five years, if I wanted to continue to pursue my 'hobby' I had to make it pay for itself - it morphed and
grew from there! I'd love to get to the point where we can pursue the
business as our primary source of income and my husband can handle the
'office' side of things so I can just make things...sigh, that seems a
long way off right now.

4. Do you have a favorite Quote or Verse?
Jeremiah 29:11 is my favorite verse - 'For I know the plans I
have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to
harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." '

5. Are you currently reading a book?
We'll be moving soon, so I'm reading 'Home Rules' by Nate Berkus so that I've got some guidelines for redecorating. I love that he emphasizes the use of color and
makes suggestions about where to splurge in your budget and where you
can cheat and go cheap but still get a great look.

Raw Green Garnet and Argentium Sterling Silver Necklace

***You'll find Spice of Life Designs on facebook
*** I rarely twitter these days, but you can find me on Twitter
***My organically styled jewlery handmade in argentium sterling silver
can be found HERE also HERE
***and in my recently reopened Artfire shop.

***I also have an email list that I use to promote new designs, special offers, and my favorite thing - coupons!
You can sign up for the Spice of Life Designs
Jewelry by Megan Martin mailing list

AND Now For The Fun Stuff
Megan is offering a 20% discount to our readers. The coupon code is - SHEsAwesome .
Just type it in when checking out. The coupon is good until March 1.


Posted by Sonja

Comfort food

It's a great time for comfort food and SHE team members have been busy cooking up a storm!
Rather than listing recipes I'm giving links to the recipes on blogs for you to check out. Bon appetit!



Chicken Tetrazzini by Donna (NaturallyComfy)


















Creamy corn chowder by JewelsByJane



















Chocolate Pudding by thehandmaden




















Onion Tarts by raggyrat

Are you hungry yet? Now go do some cooking!

Posted by Kelly of The Handmaden

Toys, toys, toys!!

Yes, today's focus is on toys or objects that inspire play. Enjoy...




Tawashi - Lime green octopus by flutterbugcreations








Knitted Farm Animals by mamma4earth



























She makes me smile crochet pattern by chriscrochetcrazy




























Goldilocks and the Three Bears Waldorf Playset by theenchantedcupboard



























Cranberry Child's Pouch Sling for Dolls & Teddies by earthslings


Posted by Kelly of The Handmaden

Color me happy!

 From the team this week I've selected fun and happy colors!

Fibre Beads from Ebrown2503

                              Big Rainbow bling from isewcute

                      Bringing Hope Notecards by Wellofcreations

Hand dyed silk mandala scarf from me! (Blowing my own trumpet)

          Rainbow Window Star from harvestmoonbyhand

          I hope these beautiful items have brightened your day!

Posted by Kelly of The Handmaden

Show Him That You Love Him

This Valentine's Day let SHEteam help you choose the perfect gift for him.


Winter Musk Goats Milk Shaving Soap
By - Country Soaps By Marlen


Warm Wool Socks - Handcranked - Double Hem Top
by - Shady Side Farm



Fleece Golf ball Scarf By - Naturally Comfy


...and for the Little Man



Funky Monkey Pants and Long Sleeve Appliqued Bodysuit
by - Adorable Blessings



Wooden Airplane Classic Toy By - The Wood Garden



Bright Soft Textured Blocks - By Poppy Patch

Posted by - Sonja

A Home School/Home Business Success Story

I am really excited to bring this interview to you today. As a homeschooling mother of four, it is always encouraging to me to hear the success stories of other homeschool families. It is even more encouraging to see the children, who have been homeschooled, grow up and move out into the world and be successful. Here is one of those encouraging stories. I hope you enjoy...

Tell Us About Your Crafting
Q - How long have you been crafting?
A - TemporaryTrappings is a combined family endeavor which includes myself - Ashley,
my mom, Caroline, my two younger sisters, Sarah and Julie and even our grandma, who helps us work our booth at craft shows. My great-grandma often crafted and passed along a lot of her supplies to her grandchildren (my mom), including some really cool sequins and beads that we still have. My mom began crafting during her teen years, learning to sew, cross stitch, and then jewelry making. When my sisters and I were young she would make our dresses and pajamas. As we grew up, she passed on her love of crafting to my sisters and I. Decorative painting remains one of her greatest passions and combining that with jewelry making is where her current interest is. Christmas ornaments will always be a big part of her crafting as well. 2011 marks about 28 years of our combined crafting experience as a family, and we have big plans for our crafting business in 2011! We each have our areas of interest: Ashley, jewelry and clay; Sarah scrapbooking and paper crafting; Julie, jewelry and metal working.

Q - Do you have childhood memories of a crafting success or failure?
A - The one event that I can remember as a child which really started my crafting journey was learning how to macramé. My mom taught herself because I wanted to learn how, and after she mastered it, she taught me. I remember spending one whole day (which seemed forever when you’re ten years old!) trying to get the hang of all those knots. I turned my new skill into a salvation bracelet that included a little poem about the symbolism of the colors of each of the crosses that were knotted within the bracelet. Another memory which we all share is all of the craft shows that we have done over the years. Whether or not we participated in them, they were always a family event and are great places to get those creative juices flowing.



Q - Do you have your own workspace?
A - Any flat surface fills our needs. haha



Q - Could you tell us about it?
A - Actually, we do have a room on the second floor of our house that is dedicated to housing all of our crafting supplies and tools. More often than not, what ends up happening is we go “shopping” in our craft room, take our goodies downstairs and end up making our pieces in various places around the house as we like being together as a family and there just isn’t enough workspace in the craft room. That is another one of our goals this year - to redesign our crafting room to better accommodate multiple crafters/projects. It just isn’t fun to have to clean up your project, completed or not, and then get it all back out again to work on it. Too much time is wasted with the set up and tear down and it can become discouraging.

Q - What inspires you to create new pieces?
A - Well each one of us has our own different interests, which inspire us to create our own unique pieces. For instance, my younger sister Julie is really into the vintage, steampunk style. She loves all things that have to do with the Renaissance and learning how things work, and is teaching herself how to cut out charms from metal. Right now she’s working on designing jewelry for a local band called Summit Grove, and in one of her pieces she throws her steampunk style in the mix by sewing cogs and gears onto this beautiful flower piece. It’s all about knowing what you like, and learning how to have your personal style come through in your work.


Your Homeschool Life

Q - Are you currently home schooling?
A - If so how many and what ages/grades? While I am currently in college, working on my BA, I was homeschooled during high school. My two younger sisters, Sarah and Julie are being homeschooled right now.

Q - What challenges do you face when combining homeschooling and home business?
A - Being homeschooled was a wonderful experience. It allowed me the time to work at the pace I needed to learn at, while giving me extra time to spend with family, friends and on finding my hobbies. The one thing that I, and I know the rest of my family deals with, is the struggle with staying on schedule. When you spend a lot of time at home, it is easy to let yourself fall into the project/subject at hand, which can consume your day if you don’t have a set “length of time” for it. This seems to be a blessing and a hindrance of schooling at home. Your day is your own and allows you to study what you want, at your own pace. Consistently using a planner has helped us tremendously! Once you learn to conquer the schedule and make time for the things that need to get done, everything else falls into place.



More About Yourself
Q - What is your education background?
A - After graduating from a long distance, high school education program in the spring of 2008, I began working on my Bachelor’s. Right now I am in my junior year and am a full-time student.

Q - Did you do other work before you began selling your handmade arts or crafts? If yes, what was it?
A - Along with spending any extra time we have crafting, Sarah and I both work part time jobs in a book store, (just can’t stay away from books … lol) and our family helps out friends with babysitting during the week as needed. Prior to coming home full time to raise our family my mom worked in advertising and desktop publishing. Both of these skills have helped in our home crafting business.



Q - Why did you choose to start your home business?
A - After tagging along to a few craft shows that my mom participated in while I was in high school, I realized that we needed a way to get our crafts online. I eventually found Etsy.com and it wasn’t long before our shop was up and running.

Q - Do you have a favorite Quote or Verse (or both if you wish to share)

“As we look not to what is seen but to what is unseen; for what is seen is transitory, but what is unseen is eternal.” 2 Corinthians 4:18

"It is well that we have hobbies and crafts, not only do they give a sense of purpose but they have a purpose of themselves, too." ~ Phyllis George


Q - Are you currently reading a book? If so, what is it and would you recommend it to others? Why or why not?
A - I (Caroline) just finished reading Choosing to See by Mary Beth Chapman and I highly recommend it! In fact, I liked it so much I purchased our own copy and my daughters are all taking turns reading it. It is a book that teaches us that we can have our *plans* for our life, but in the end, God’s path for us may not be the one that we chose, but it is the one that takes us to the places we need to visit, willingly or not, and the grace to see us through difficult situations, sustaining us when it becomes too hard, and seeing us through to the other side of it, healing us along the way. I truly admire Mary Beth and her family for the gift of this book, as painful as it was to write, but the blessing of the book for them and for anyone that reads it is a gift that keeps giving as the need to reread it will undoubtedly come up. And I did enjoy Mary Beth’s honesty about her personal faults…many of which I share with her, thinking I was the only one quirky like that.

Q - Where else could we find you on the web?
A - We are currently working on updating the layout of our following websites:
www.temporarytrappings.blogspot.com
http://temporarytrappings.tumblr.com/



The picture of the necklace(above) is a piece my sister Julie designed for a local band from Las Vegas called Summit Grove. It can be bought by visiting Summit Groves facebook page.





Posted By - Sonja

Homeschooling Fun- Christmas Wrap-Up

For the month of December we decided to take a more relaxed approach to school and spent a large part of our time studying Christmas Around the World. Here is the final post from a series of posts we did focusing on this special time of year.

Crafts+Foods+Holiday Traditions=Homeschooling Fun!

Christmas Wrap-Up

Now that the New Year is here, I decided I should take some time to wrap up our Christmas Around the World posts. While in America most of us have begun putting away our holiday regalia, in Siberia and elsewhere the holiday season has just begun. So here's the rest of what we learned this Christmas....We can still have a fruitful year even if our wheat didn't grow 6 to 8 inches. We were amazed how quickly it grew at all.My version of the Croatian Licitar Heart is neither dough nor edible, but it does have a "mirror" of aluminum foil to reflect the soul.Babuska may be a legend in parts of Russia (La Befana in Italy), but a good friend in Siberia has never heard stories of her. She does make a cute ornament, though.

And for the food...Bolivian Bunuelos- These are a more Puerto Rican style, but I look forward to trying authentic Bolivian Bunuelos someday.Puerto Rican Pasteles- Not sure the masa I made out of pumpkin, green bananas, plantains, potatoes and yucca was quite right, but the filling was delicious. Again, I'd love to try authentic pasteles in the future.Tanzanian Green Beans & Potatoes- A yummy version of potato salad that I will have to make again, though next time I may go for smaller veggies.
Philippino Pancit Bihon- An excellent recipe and a crowd pleaser. This may become a regular at our house.Croatian Braid Bread- So good! This tangy, sweet bread is a treat I hope to make more in the future. It is wonderful breakfast bread.
Russian Tea & Cakes- Excellent and a favorite even before this Christmas, albeit not Siberian necessarily. Alex sent us some favored Siberian salads that we will have to try soon.American Green Bean Casserole- It wouldn't be the holidays without it, right?

Hope all had (or are having) a wonderful holiday season. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Re-posted from http://lowgrass.blogspot.com/2011/01/christmas-wrap-up.html

By- K Low