Saturday Spotlight: Life Behind The Blogger

Good Saturday Morning everyone.  This will be out last Spotlight for 2014.  Susan and I are going to take the month of December off from Spotlight.  With all the hussle and bussle of the holidays upon us we thought this would be a good break for us to enjoy the holiday.
I will be back in January with a line up of wonderful bloggers for Spotlight.  Susan will be taking both December and January off to be with family and other commitments.  You will still be able to enjoy Spotlight on Saturday on my blog for the month of January.  So after the fun of the holidays is over please come back in January to enjoy the spotlight features once again.

Happy Holidays!

Susan from Must Love Junk, and myself wanted to do a regular feature on our blogs, something unique that hasn't been done before.   So we came up with an idea to 'spotlight the real life behind the blogger' in a more personal way.

There is so much talent and inspiration in blogland, and we thought it would be fun to bring you a closer look at the person behind the blog.

Every week on Saturday we will spotlight a blogger and have them tell us a little bit about themselves and their blogs.  You will be able to see and read about each of the bloggers on both Susan's and my blog.

November 29 

Marie from Lost Bird Studio

Happy Saturday.  This week I am featuring Marie from Lost Bird Studio.  You will love getting to know this blogger if you have not met her yet.  She is so talented and creates such beautiful treasures.  Enjoy getting to know Marie.




Hello everyone,

When Kris asked me to be in the spotlight I was very honored but also had second thoughts about it as I usually don’t  share too much about my private life. To be honest just the thought of sharing  my photo horrified me, lol.   I just hate getting my picture taken  - but I finally found one which my husband took while we were  traveling  last September through the beautiful countryside of New Hampshire and that’s were we partly at home. OK,  let’s get started.

My name is Marie and I blog over @ Lost Bird Studio where I share my creations since five years.

Yes, this is me. I am married to a wonderful and supportive husband for almost 32 years. I am a registered nurse and worked in Germany as well as in the US. Due my husband job I gave up my professional career a few years ago and I primarily take care of our residencies in the US and Germany – which is not always easy.

Sometimes I am asked why I named my blog “Lost Bird Studio”? Well, one day I was playing around – never reading instructions – and all over sudden I had a blog and was asked “please name your blog”. Not thinking of that before, I felt at this moment like a lost bird. That is the story behind the name.

I create with different media and love to decorate. I have been soldering for a long time and enjoy creating charms – which is my trademark in blog land.

To get a flavor about the variety of work I do  I prepared a few photo collages for you.

Hope you enjoy them

Some of my fabric creations.

Love to decorate and create things for the home.

Soldering is a real passion of mine.

Love to work in our garden

Two years ago, we gave our garden house a make over in the French shabby chic style. That was such a fun project, but I can assure you, that without inspiration from all the wonderful blogs it would never have happened.

Kris, thank you so much again for inviting me over to be in your spotlight. It was fun and not so difficult as I thought.

A wonderful Holiday Season to all of you.

Love and hugs,

Marie

Thanks so much Marie for sharing your story with all of us and saying Yes.  See It was easy peasy and not hard to do.  I am so happy we all got to learn more about you.
Now that you have met Marie please hop over to Susan's Must Love Junk and meet another wonderful blogger Michele from Shelstring.

Girlfriend Charity Party And A Thank You

I thought I would share a few little preps I am doing for my annual Girlfriend Charity Christmas Party.

A little background.  About 8 years ago I started this party to gather all my girlfriends together for a night of sharing our love for each other and the wonderful friendships we share.  Christmas seemed the perfect time to have this gathering.  A night for fun, eating, laughing and sharing of gifts etc.

This party started out as just my close girlfriend group and then it expanded over the years to some of my girlfriends bringing their besties to the party and now my two daughter's are bringing thier bff's.  So our small girlfriend group has expanded and has become such a fun group of women.

I do a theme each year for the party.  We all wear our most comfy pj's and slippers.  Why???? well because you need to be comfy for eating, drinking and laughing!!!!

Best Part of This Party:
  Each girl brings an exchange gift where  some or most of the proceeds of buying this gift go to benefit a favorite charity.  It amazes me each year the beautiful and thoughtful gifts each girl will bring to the exchange.  Everyone always has a great story of why they chose the gift and the particular charity. Very touching.

A while back I shared with you what my girlfriend exchange gift for this year will be.  You can see that post here.

Every year I try to come up with a cute gift bag that each girl will get to take home all the goodies from the party.

This year I found the cutest bag at Tattered Tiques Christmas Open House.  They took  large white bags and added a cute christmas truck stamp on each bag for the open house. 

 I asked the girls if they would make up some of these for my party.  So they did and then I did a little embellishing to them too.  I always add some take home favors in each bag.

Here is what I did:

This is the shopping bag I got from the girls at Tattered Tiques.  Good size white paper bag with the cute stamped truck.

Yep! gotta love this stamp pattern.

Got some red jingle bells from Michaels.

Pretty checked ribbon and large clear plastic bags.

Found these adorable gift tags at Hobby Lobby.  $1.99 with half off Christmas for a bag of 12.  Score!

Tied off the gift tags and bells with bakers twine to the handle of the bags.

These bags are cute and good size for each girl to take home all their goodies and the gift from the exchange.

I got each girl the Oprah Christmas Favorite Magazine.  Remember when she had her TV show, the Favorite Show in particular where she gave away all those wonderful gifts.  She continues this with her Christmas edition magazine and highlights great gifts. There is also a chance in this magazine to win fabulous gifts.  Gotta love what Oprah started here with her favorite gifts and giveaways.

It is just a fun favor to give each of the girls in their bag.  Tied the magazine off in the clear bags with ribbon and a candy cane.

Here it is already for each girl to have at the party.

 One thing checked off the list as I prepare for the party.

I have 17 besties coming to the party this year.  I just love that my daughters have joined my group and have their friends joining in now.  It is a great night of friendship sharing.


It is such a fun night to get everyone together to share our love of friendship, eat, drink, laugh and play fun games.  I do lots of fun prizes.  A prize for the cutes Christmas PJ's this year and cutest slippers worn.  Have prizes for the games we play too.

Stay tuned as I show you more items I am preparing for this party.
Have a great start to the new week.
Kris

*****Thank You and Big Hugs ******

A special thank you to Dore of Burlap Luxe.  I finally have gotten one of Dore's beautiful heartful art pieces for my home.  If you have ever been to Dore's Etsy  or Blog you will see some of the beautiful art work she creates and sells.  I saw this French Hen House that she created last week on her Etsy Site and my heart beat was just a little faster as I looked at this beautiful piece.  I  thought how wonderful that piece would be in my French Country Kitchen.

So on the shelf in my kitchen it went.  Look at those sweet chippy doors and the cute detail in the banner.  This french chick that is right outside her hen house has it so good.

The attention to detail that Dore uses in all her lovely pieces is amazing.  Are those arched chippy doors not the sweetest?  Oh and that cute french banner.  Little Countess d'Erouville has a beautiful French Cottage of her own.  So happy to have this sweet little vignette on my shelf in my french farm house kitchen.

Dore also gifted me one of her special french birds from her collection.

Dore I love my new french bird added to my winter vintage garden mantel.
Thank you sweet friend.  I am swooning over my beautiful treasures created by you.
My little Countess just makes me smile every morning when I see her on the shelf in the kitchen.
Hugs and Kisses attached with a big Thank you.

Light At The End Of The Tunnel

Did you ever look at a picture and just find peace and serenity looking at it.  I found it with this one.

source

I wish each and everyone of you a Very Happy Thanksgiving.  Enjoy your family and friends and all the wonderful traditions.  Safe travels for all of you traveling to be with loved ones.

Happy Thanksgiving

Kris

:)

Winter Garden Decor

Happy Sunday.  I decided to do a winter garden theme in my front entry.  I have been adding the Nordic red to the rest of my decor but up front I wanted to keep it simple and neutral just a few touches of winter garden theme.

My Hope Angel sits on the white chippy chair as you come in the entry way.

I love the serenity she gives to my decor.

White winter wreath with some angel wings and winter roses.

My entry way.  Just winter ribbons, and winter floral added here and there.

Found this up on the roof top vintage christmas book to add on the bench.

Added some holiday ribbon to my winter wreath on the old chippy garden gate.  There is a little bit of the blue again in my watering can sprinkler head and the old garden faucet.

Just wanted to keep it pretty simple up front.

My love birds in this cage have their bottle brush Christmas tree for their home decor along with some glitter winter white roses.

So as we slide on into this Thanksgiving week I wish all of you a safe and happy  gathering with friends and family.

Why is it that this time of the season goes so quickly and then January through March just drag!!!!

Have a great week.
Kris
:)