Recycled material for making tiny mini trees

Hello dear readers,

Today I'm going to show you, with photos, how I make tiny trees for nutshell scenes.


These are dried out pieces of grape stems.

I glued on green pieces of foam and this is the result.  It is also possible to
create bonsai trees with this method.

For dyeing the foam I made a mixture of 2/3 green acrylic paint and 1/3 water in a
small container and pushed inside two small chunks of foam. The foam was kept
soaking for an hour or two and been turned around several times.  I used a bamboo
skewer instead of my fingers, for taking it out to dry on some newspapers.
When dry I cut very tiny pieces to make the leaves.  I love the results with the shades
of green.

Used this small container to dye two pieces of this foam.

                                                                                                                            

You can cut the foam into very small pieces before and the green will coat the pieces
overall and evenly.  I wanted the effect of shades.

These were cut again to make even smaller pieces.

Now every gnome has a home as well as a tree.  Both trees stand, temporarily
on Plasteline. The tree on the left is with bought railway foam. The tree on the right has
my recycled foam. Which do you like more?

I wish you a lovely weekend and blessings.

Fimo gnomes and ceramic clay houses

Hello dear readers,

It so happens that all my free time is now devoted to making nutshell homes for gnomes. Already
made and gave away 11 but requests for more keep pilling up.  Boring as it is,  they all
want gnome homes. OK, so the snowmen, nativities, fairytales, and other ideas will have to wait.  Good thing there's still time till Chrismas.

I need more walnuts, preferable fresh ones which are hard to get here.  My daughter Galia
promised to get me at least 20.


Grouped the little houses before separating them.  They look so pretty together.'
like a tiny village. Also made some trees from bits of scrap sponges.

Remember the kiln-fired clay houses?  This was before transformation.

Made seven gnomes for the seven empty nutshells.
The one on the left side is too large for the shell.  He'll be sitting on a flower pot soon.

A town's neighborhood. (smile)

I wish you a great week ahead with blessings.

My name is Katherine - my friends call me Kitty

Hello dear readers,

Would you believe it?  Today, two months later, I received birthday gifts which were sent to
me by Tatiana, my dear friend from Ukraine, on May 20.  Luckily, Tatiana realizing that
the parcel didn't arrive, sent me the registered number and I was able to track down the parcel.
At the post office, they told me that two messages to my cell phone to come and claim it
were left unanswered.  Of course, the messages were sent to a wrong number.
I'm so ashamed and furious that we have such a clumsy post service. At last, the parcel was
located.  Still, it took over 2 weeks to get to me.

You cannot imagine how happy and relieved I was to open the parcel and find
this gorgeous cat girl doll, handcrafted by Tatiana, one of the most gifted miniaturist friends
I'm fortunate to have.


Kitty has got on a beautiful dress, hat, and shoes all made by Tatiana.

And, Kitty didn't come empty-handed. She brought me a beautiful vase filled
with gorgeous flowers.  A beautiful piece of lace adorned the lovely box.
Look at how sweet her little tail pips out of her dress.

Suddenly, a welcome committee arrived to inspect the lovely newcomer.
Baalatova and Solly love Kitty. She was invited to listen to Baalatova old,
fascinating stories along with Solly.

So, all is well that it ends well.  Blessings my friends