Visions of Baked Goods

We are in full holiday spirit at Bumbershoot Designs and Bumbershoot Supplies and at our home.

I'm shipping everything from Bumbershoot Designs priority mail to US customers until Dec 21, so you can receive your purchases by Christmas. 

A big thank you to all my customers, and my best wishes for a happy and joyous 2010!

At home, I’ve been working on our annual holiday goody tins, thirty five of them.

I love being able to share the Christmas spirit with my friends, familly and neighbors, in this way.

I also love the yummy treats!!!

faith, trust and a little bit of pixie dust

You may recall that our son Eric is performing in Seattle Children's Theatre's production of Peter Pan.  On Thanksgiving weekend, while he was singing, dancing, flying and fighting pirates, all with teddy bear in tow, I was working on a quilt square for a fundraising quilt for SCT.  There were requirements in terms of size, fabric, and the basic need for a two dimensional product that could go on a bed, which I'm sure makes sense to those of you who are quilters, but for an art quilter/mixed media person like myself, was a real challenge. I have an art supply shop for a reason...

There are many layers of meaning for me in this quilt square, but I'll explain one, since everyone except Eric has asked "What is the 2 for?"   It's the second star on the right....

Christmas Past

Last night I watched my first Christmas movie of the year. It was The Bishop’s Wife. Watching it made me think of all the Christmases of years gone by.

 

When citrus fruit and nuts where special gifts, and when people really did deck their halls with boughs of holly.

a satsuma by any other name..

I am ill.  This is what my husband brought to tempt me:

Isn't it perfect? 

As we approach the holiday season, it reminds me of the apples and oranges we children always found at the bottom of our Christmas stockings, and which still appear in our stockings year after year.  What a thrill it must have been to see such a jewel in your stocking centuries ago.  As we head into the American Thanksgiving holiday tomorrow, today I give thanks for the California farmers and the many others along the way, right up to and including my husband, who played a part in delivering this beautiful get-well satsuma to me.

New, Old, Always Beautiful

When I photograph supplies for Bumbershoot Supplies, I like to include photos of how these vintage treasures look when they arrive, so you can see what I see, perhaps feel a bit of the excitement I feel.  The new old stock, new since it has never been used, old since it was made many decades ago, is stored in many ways.

Sometimes wired....

Or bundled...

Or in cotton or tissue wrapping....

Sometimes the wrapping itself is a wonderful surprise....

New and old, both at the same time, always beautiful.

Any Scientist…

I have a lot of glass cabochons. I store some of them in these wonderful vintage jars.

Not only are these jars beautiful and practical, they can be seen in the Sherlock Holmes movie, The Spider Woman! “You called these glass cases ‘cages’. Any Scientist would call them terrariums.” Those are ours!(Okay, technically they aren’t the same ones that were used in the film but they look identical!) Next time you watch the film look for our “terrariums”.

Crystal Clear

I love crystals.

I love how they reflect light on even the grayest Seattle days.

The Cornucopia of Autumn

"Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness,

Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun;

Conspiring with him how to load and bless

With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eves run;"

~John Keats

Yellow Leaves

"That time of year thou mayst in me behold

When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang

Upon those boughs which shake against the cold,

Bare ruined choirs, where late the sweet birds sang."

~William Shakespeare

I love fall.

Stars

I just got these vintage white star cabochons in my supplies shop.

Now, they remind me very much of some hair pins in a scene in Sherlock Holmes: The Master Blackmailer. In the big ball scene, one of the girls is twirling around having a great time (one of the few times in this movie where anyone is happy,) and she has a trio of little white stars in her hair.
So I say, why couldn't you do it yourself? Glue some hairpins onto a few of these stars, stick 'em in your hair, and twirl away.
Awesome Edwardian detective not included.

Dress up

So you're going to be Grace Kelly for Halloween. Well you must look the part.
We suggest to you these simple, elegant designs.

Perfect Classic Pearls

Graduated Pearls

P.S.

Playing Grace Kelly's leading man?

These are for you.

Classic Pearl Cufflinks

Tempest

"All day the wind had screamed and the rain had beaten against the windows, so that even here in the heart of great, hand-made London we were forced to raise our minds for an instant from the routine of life and recognise the presence of those great elemental forces which shriek at mankind through the bars of his civilisation, like untamed beasts in a cage." ~ The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

I do think that a gale is a good time to create. Cosy up in your studio with a cup of tea and all of your lovely supplies and creative ideas and just make art.  Let the sound of the rain beating against the house inspire you.

"Double, double toil and trouble..."

Here’s a collection for all your Halloween needs. You can find all of this at Bumbershoot Supplies.

Or check out one of our fantastic Halloween kits.

But hurry! Halloween is just around the corner!

Tracking

Having a shop, takes a lot of work. It's not all fun and games you know. There are mountains of paperwork too.

Fortunately, there are enough gems to make the paperwork a little brighter.

"That which we call a rose..."

Did you know that I currently have a ton of vintage rose cabochons in my supplies shop?

Oh yeah.

Here's just a small selection.