Candy shop sweets

Hello dear readers,

Here is what I managed to make up to now.

These are for the window display.

Just for demonstration.  Nothing is glued in place yet.  There may be more.

The inside of the box, painted. The shelves glued in place.  I had some rose lace strips which I glued to the back of the shelves. It looks bad now, but when finished, only the shelves will be seen. It is impossible to see the two holes I drilled in the middle of the box, below the top.  I put a thin wire through these holes to allow the box to hang on a nail in the wall.

For the lollipop sticks, I shaved a toothpick to make it narrow.

Painted a drop of red nail polish on the cookies to make it look like jam.

The chocolate bears are brown painted beads.

The little glass jars came with ugly plastic stoppers which I hated to throw away.  Here you can see my attempts to make something out of them. Cups!  The handles are cuts from a narrow drink plastic straw.

Hope to finish this project soon.

Have a wonderful, creative rest of the week with blessings.

Candy shop slow progress

Hello dear readers,

Working with my great-grand-daughter Dana was pure joy. On Saturday, she came and stayed with me for a few hours.  I wanted us to make candies for the shop together, but Dana had other plans. She wanted to make pipe-cleaner animals.  She created one little teddybear working on it for almost one hour and was very happy with the results.  Then she made a small pipe cleaner basket and filled it with tiny yellow foam balls (food for the teddies). I gave her another little bear, a dog, and a cat.  She was gloriously happy with the lot.  We glued the two teddies and their food under a transparent cover to keep them safe from predators (little brother).

For the candy shop, we made Ferrero Rocher boxes.  We used the original wrappings from the candy itself.  Punched 1.5 cm circles out of the golden sheet and 0.5 cm circles out of the brown paper cup.  Dana cupped each golden circle with the end of a rubber topped pencil, put a small bead inside and rolled it into a ball. Then she cupped the brown circles and glued the golden ball into each. It remained for me to glue 8 balls in two rows onto pieces of a clear acetate,  wait until they dried and cover them with chewing gum blisters.  Dana stuck the original candy label on top of each blister.

Time passed away too quickly. My daughter Galia, Dana's grandmother who lives close by, came to take her back.  She was staying with them for a few days but had to go back to her parents.  They live in the Ashdod, a town one hour by car far from us. It will be long before I see her again as school starts next week.

To summarise Dana's visit:  Not much was accomplished for the shop. Between the two of us, a few Ferrero Rocher real-life candies are resting in peace within us.  I learned new dance steps and new versions of old pop songs played on Dana's cellular phone.  Sorry, no photos. There were only the two of us and no one to take photos.  There was a lot of laughter and joyful "ohs" as well as bright suggestions about the shop's door, leaving me with instructions  "For a knob make a cupcake. For a handle make a lollipop".  Needless to mention how much I'll miss Dana.

I wish you the best with blessings!

Candy shop facade

Hello dear readers,

The flower shop is still pending.  While waiting for the perplex front, Meantime, I started a new, small project, a hanging candy shop facade.  It's also going to be sort of a tutorial in series.

Didn't have any shallow box at hand.  Instead,  a cheap wooden backgammon box (About 3/00 US$) cut in the middle yielded 4 shallow shells for 4 hanging shop facades.  I only had to cut some scrap wooden straps, found in the trash, (luckily the same width) and glue them to the open part of the box.

From the scrap piece, I cut one length for the shelves to be glued onto.

6 wooden tongue depressors were bound together and cut uniformly. Each 2  were glued together. making 3 shelves.

Tomorrow, I'll glue and paint.  My sweet 12 years old great granddaughter Dana, will come and work with me. We plan to make some candies together.  I am very excited about it.  This is the first time one of my offsprings shows interest in my hobby.

I wish you a lovely weekend with blessings.

The Barbecue

Hello dear readers,

Wish there was some escape from the melting heat we are enduring these days.  Finishing the barbecue project provided a refuge by spending more hours at home with the a/c on full time.
Not so sure about the photos, photography is not my strong point.

The patio

With plants

Complete with barbecue, etc. 

The cute Dalmatian is a gift from Jennifer.

The beautiful spider plant and the two lovely plants by its side are gifts from Carmen.

The geraniums in their egg-carton planters.

All ready for the people to come and enjoy their meal.

Wishing you all a wonderful weekend with blessings.

Witchy Chic Gifts from Germany

Hello dear readers,

Nobody was more surprised than me to see Baalatova, with her usual "Haughty, Hard to Satisfy" facial expression, smiling smugly. To my knowledge, this never happened before.  It was very strange to suddenly hear her humming mysteriously making me wonder what was going to happen. And then arrived a  totally unexpected, surprise parcel from dear Birgit full of magical gifts.  Can it be possible that now that she has her magic wand back, Baalatova cast a spell, making Birgit send the parcel?

I should have known something was cooking. Some weeks ago Baalatova demanded a special space for a garden.  Thanks to Birgit there will hopefully be peace and quiet for the next two months, while Baalatova is working on her garden.

I shall also have to start seriously plan a bedroom for Baalatove, with new shelves to accommodate these fantastic potion bottles and other awesome items, all crafted by my incredibly talented friend, Birgit.

THANK YOU DEAR BIRGIT FOR YOUR  KIND GESTURE, GENEROSITY AND, MOST OF ALL, FOR YOUR FRIENDSHIP!

Here is a glimpse of the almost completed barbecue project.

I wish you all pleasant and cooler days of Summer with blessings.

Barbecue for two

Hello,  dear readers,

A barbecue needs food.  Besides the meat items on the grill, there must be at least, one green salad and some fruit for dessert.

I dared, for the first time, to make a lettuce salad.
Hope it resembles a r/l one.  Bowl is a gift from Maria.

This is a fruit tray made by Goldie. a super talented miniaturist and a good friend.  I love the mouthwatering figs and watermelon, what can be more refreshing on a hot summer day? Not so sure about my grapes which I added.  Should I leave them there?

The table is set for two.  The meat will be served on wooden plates.
Like I wrote in my previous post, there will be many gifts from friends displayed in this project.
The glasses on the table are part of a birthday gift from Karin.
Forks and knives are also part of a birthday gift from Kaisa.

This is the barbecue grill I won from Alexandra's giveaway.  Added a mustard and catsup set as well as 5 large Nurnberger sausages for Birgit. 

I wish you all a creative week ahead and those of you, on vacations, have fun!

Barbecue in the Patio

Dear readers,

It's over a month since my last post.  Much has happened meantime.  My computer decided to finally give-up after many attempts to bring it back to life.  On top of it and right in the middle of the hottest time in summer here in Israel, the main air conditioner stopped cooling.  If this was not enough, the TV net started to make trouble. For a technician from the supplier to come and check the net I had to wait 3 weeks.  I decided to change suppliers and it took only 3 days and a better deal. The young technician who came to install the new TV net, was very kind and restored the air-conditioner.
Now I have a working TV net, a new internet line, a working air-conditioning and a NEW COMPUTER!!

The flower shop is almost finished, except for a "glass" front and ceiling.  A friend bought me a large poster frame from IKEA.  I intend to use the perplex from this frame as glass. The only delay is that I don't know when my friend will have time to come and visit and I am unable to take the time and go to her.

This is why I started to make the Patio barbecue scene.  Here are a few photos of what was done already.

Hanging plants.  I created the plants and the ceramic pots. The wall is only for demonstration.

It was time consuming but worth the efforts.  Some of the pots will hang on the shop's walls.

From a paper covered wire I made the hangings part for the pots. It's barely possible to see it when installed on the wall and can be moved easily if necessary.

Created these two "straw" chairs from burlop . (Tutorial here)

Added a table and a stool.

This is only the beginning.  I intend to use many of the gifts and swaps with friends for this project.

Enjoy lovely summer days with blessings!