easter's on its way

Isn't that the cutest little banner? I made it last year, before I was a blogger, and did not keep a source for it. Then, as I was reading Today's Creative Blog a week ago, she showed a picture of my inspiration piece. Whew, now I can give credit to Made for this adorable banner. You will notice that I did not sew around each felt bunny as she did. I tried, but they did not appear as perfect as hers, so I resorted to sewing a line through the ears onto my grosgrain ribbon. No one I know will have seen the original version, so they won't know I took a shortcut! I also didn't have enough felt to make a real pattern, so it is very random as to placement of colors.

If you are drooling over that little set up there, Gordon surprised me with the blue vase {from Tiffany} on our 3rd anniversary. I kept the box, oh yeah. When it's not in use, it is displayed on the top shelf of the right hand book case. See there...in the empty space next to the blue and white clam shell and above the book shelf speaker. Oh, that pocket watch belonged to my Opa. I loved my Oma and Opa even though they still lived in Germany and we were in the U.S. The times spent with them are lovely memories for my brother and me.

Gordon designed and built the book shelves, added the fireplace, laid the tiles and regrouted twice. I didn't think the first color of grout was dark enough and neither did he. Where the giclee print is now, there used to be a television. We took it out and put it in our basement family room. I love that print, because it is pretty much the view I have from my front window, except for there is a barn where the deer are standing and we usually see our two horses with only an occasional deer.

Okay, back to the reason for this post.

Here you can see where I just sewed the bunny through the ears to the ribbon. And, every bunny needs carrots, right? I cut my felt into a triangle and since I didn't have any batting, I used cotton balls to stuff them. Okay, you can stop rolling your eyes now. The green tops were made by cutting a rectangle as long as the longest side of the triangle and cutting into the green felt strip to make it fringy. I cheated and hot glued it to the inside of the carrot. I also added orange french knots with some embroidery floss.

Can I just say it? I love this project. And I am sure I will love it every year after this when I pull out the Easter bin from the crawl space.

Jelly beans in our urn and a bowl with several mini albums are on our coffee table right now. I did have to remove several 4-Wheeler and Off-Road Jeep magazines just to take these photos...keepin' it real for ya! Well, and maybe a few scrappy mags might have littered the coffee table also.

And this is my version of a German Easter tree. My Tante Jette usually uses white spray painted branches, but I forget to do that every year. So, mine hang from these {fake} fern fiddle heads. Most of these ornaments have been in my collection since Zach was just a baby.

Don't you love that JOY pillow that my friend Gina made for me? She is a wonderful seamstress with a kind and loving heart and a joy to call a friend. {Hi, Gina, as you feed Isabella - she has an Isabella, too - and catch up on your blogs on your iPad2.} She definitely needs to have an Etsy shop when her girls are older...you might remember this project she made for me back in the Summer. It still makes me smile!

Every year, I have to remind the girls not to eat the jelly beans! And taking inspiration from Wendy Smedley's hosting week at Write.Click.Scrapbook., I spray painted an old frame from my Mom and added one of these subway prints {mine is a 5x7, the shop versions are 4x6} to it. I embellished with some spiral cut circle felt flowers adorned with buttons.

Yep, you guessed it, I used some baker's twine from The Twinery to make those felt flowers even cuter!

Speaking of baker's twine, you might want to head over to The Twinery blog today for a special coupon code and lots of inspiration from my Design Team buddies, of course! 

And, today, I have a layout featured at Write.Click.Scrapbook. Erin Sweeney is hosting and I know you'll enjoy everything she's sharing this week. Tomorrow is give.away.day. so you'll need to leave your entry comment before 8pm EST.