We got home from the airport at 3:30AM and it was great to be here.  We normally have some crazy things happen on travel day and this was no exception.  We left St. Maarten with the airplane about 50% empty, which was great.  We could spread out between our three seats and not be attached at the hip (literally) to a stranger.  The flight attendants told us that we were leaving early and getting in early to Charlotte, NC, which is a great relief because you have to go through customs, pick up your luggage, have it re-checked, then go through security and get to your new gate within a little over an hour.  As we started our descent into Charlotte, the pilot said we were getting in early and put the landing gear down.   Suddenly the airplane picked up speed and the landing gear was re-stowed.  We circled the airport a couple of times and the pilot got back on the microphone, and said an airplane ahead of us made it so we couldn’t land.  (I thought they would have had that all planned out the first time when our landing gear came down.)  So instead of getting in early, we were now getting in late.   I travel with a wheelchair because I can’t walk fast enough to get from point A to point B to make our connections, so we had to wait for the chair to come up from under the airplane where they store it during flight.  You probably are wondering why I don’t use one of those transport carts that are basically a golf cart.    My artificial knee doesn’t bend enough to fit comfortably inside and it’s just easier to use my own wheelchair.  The problem comes when you have a tight connection and the chair doesn’t come up very fast, which of course was the case this time.  American Airlines gives you an assistant to push the chair and take us through the airport more efficiently.  We went through customs and by everyone from our flight had already been there and left.  We got our luggage which came up pretty quickly and finished going through customs.  The time delay at this point made going back through security a time crunch.  TSA does a whole body pat down on me and for some reason on the flights I had this time, they did a really thorough job.  I mean running their fingers through my very short hair, kind of thorough.  Normally I think it’s kind of funny, but when we are short on time, I start to panic.  That’s when we found out our next flight was delayed about thirty minutes, which was a tremendous relief.  We had time to get hot chocolate, as Charlotte was around 30 degrees and the airport not much warmer.  We boarded the plane and sat.  We were going to taxi to our runway but then the pilot said that our runway was closed.  I’m not sure why they closed a runway at 11PM, but apparently they did.  So we taxied to another runway and sat some more.  Almost two hours later, we were in the air.  We should have gotten to Pittsburgh at 11:40 and were there at almost 2AM.  We have almost a two hour drive after that and it was 5 degrees and our car was a solid ice ball so it had to defrost.  I went into the hotel where it was parked and made hot tea for Rich and I while he chopped ice.  If we had known we were getting in that late, we would have had our dog sitter stay the night and we could stay another night in Pittsburgh, but you never know when these things will happen, and you can’t call someone at 11PM and ask them to change their plans.

A long and very boring story to say our flights were delayed.  The funny thing is that we believe we might be travel cursed.  It’s usually around weather or flight delays.  We’ve been caught in two hurricanes in the same year.  In 1999, we were in Orlando for Rich’s work and that hurricane changed path at the last moment so we were spared but it was the first time Disney had ever closed due to a hurricane.  It was my fortieth birthday that year, so we decided to go to St. Maarten for my birthday, which is technically out of hurricane since it’s November 22nd.    St. Maarten was hit with a level 4 hurricane while we were there.  An unbelievable experience, but one I don’t want to repeat.

We almost never go anywhere without our flights being delayed or cancelled.  For our 25th anniversary, we decided we should cruise the Mediterranean as we’ve always wanted to see the pyramids.  It was a two week cruise over Christmas and we knew we have these problems with flight delays, so we left Friday AM, knowing our cruise left Sunday at 6PM.  I chose the most direct flights I could, going from Pittsburgh to Newark, NJ, to Barcelona, Spain.  Apparently there was a snowstorm in Newark and our plane wasn’t large enough to handle it so they cancelled our flight.  Rich went to the ticketing agent to change our flights and she said (and I’m not lying), we can get you there on Tuesday, at which time I immediately burst into tears.  After a lot of typing, she came up with sending us from Pittsburgh to Cleveland, where they had a larger plane, to Newark, to Madrid, Spain, to Barcelona.  We got to Newark with no problem and sat at the gate for six hours directly beside our original plane (where our luggage was.)  When we finally got to Barcelona, our luggage wasn’t there.  So we filed our missing luggage paperwork and went to the hotel.  This is now Saturday around noon.  Instead of sightseeing, we spent the time buying additional clothes, because we had a set or two in our carry-on, but we might not see our luggage for two weeks with our luck.  We had decided this would be the trip of a lifetime, so we booked a suite where we had our own butler, it was awesome.  When we got onboard, he wanted to unpack our luggage and we told him it was missing and he couldn’t understand why we weren’t more upset.   They sent the concierge for the ship to offer to let us go through the “lost and found room” for clothes and we told them we were fine.  They gave us tee shirts and toiletries and left not understanding why we weren’t mad or upset.  The cruise left port and still no luggage so we went to dinner.  When we got back from dinner, our luggage was there.  We were amazed and thrilled since we were already committed to never seeing it until we got home.  When you have this travel curse, you have to roll with the flow.   For some reason, the only stamps in our passport were Spain and Egypt.  When we were on our way home, after seeing the stamps, customs pulled Rich out of line and said his name was on a “list” and took him away.  I had no idea where he was or what was going on, but about twenty minutes later, he came back and said they asked him why he was in Egypt and had he ever been convicted of a crime (an odd combination of questions we thought), and when he said we were on a cruise and no, he’d never been convicted of a crime, they let him go.   We’re cursed.

We’ve been delayed for (and I’m not making these up) the concourse we are supposed to fly into having a fire, weather they can’t fly in or around, airplane parts literally falling off (a flight attendant showed us the part, as she had it in her apron), missing crew, missing airplane (we were on a charter and the plane wasn’t available for two days) going to Punta Cana.  We thought there was going to be a riot in the airport when they announced that delay.  We spent two lovely days in Cleveland instead of Punta Cana.  That was in the early days of people flying there and they had very low standards including the elevator in the hotel.  It stopped between floors and Rich had to lift me three feet to get me out.  They sprayed pesticides every night and so many people on the charter got sick from it.  There were four people including us, that spoke English in the hotel.  On the bus ride to the hotels, we were told never to leave our hotel compounds as it was not safe and we had guards at the gates to ensure no one came inside.  Needless to say, we haven’t been back, although we’ve heard great things about it since.

I keep a travel journal for many reasons, but one is to remember all the crazy things we’ve encountered along the way.  I made a video log of this trip and you’ll hear some funny things that have happened on St. Maarten trips, including the hurricane.

I’ve heard people at airports say they have never been delayed on a flight and I ask if they are on our flight. If so, their luck is about to change.

It’s good to be home.

I’m not sure what happened here and apologize for the wrong video below.  I’m adding the right video today and again, am sorry for the mistake.

I saw a video from Country Sampler Magazine where they made a clothespin wreath.  I saw Lindsay the Frugal Crafter use peg stamps to stamp clothespins and decided to combine both ideas for a gift that is both inexpensive and cute.

I used two peg stamps, one is the Stars and Stripes small heart and the other is three twinkling stars.  I used Night of Navy and Real Red dye inks from Stampn’ Up.

At first I stamped the clothespins together on the holder, then took them off so I could stamp the edges.

It takes roughly 62 clothespins to make this project as well as a bow of some kind.

The stamping is very fast and I think the whole project took less than thirty minutes to stamp and place the clothespins.  Making the bow took more time than the rest of the project.

You will place your first clothespin on the inside two wires then the next one, place as close as you can on the second and third wires, then repeat until you have the wreath done.

I made my bow out of burlap ribbon I bought at the Dollar Tree.  The total cost for the wreath was $5 (if you have stamps and ink.)

This is the video I saw that showed how to make the wreath.

This is Lindsay’s video that shows you how to stamp the clothespins.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9a2Yg3_Bl1Y&t=1s

I have a crazy busy day ahead of me. I’m trying to make sure I finish several videos before we leave tomorrow as well as give Rich the time to put them up.  I’m making the scented bath salts in a Christmas ball ornament as well as making the mini album and hopefully, taking the time to make the 2017 planner I promised a couple of weeks ago.  I had so many ideas swirling around in my head that I couldn’t sleep.  So I got up at 4AM and started cleaning my craft room.  I find nothing puts me to sleep faster than organizing and boy, did that room need organizing!  By 5:30 I was back in bed, exhausted.

I haven’t packed yet, but I’m a last minute packer.  I like to make sure that I have everything I need, and the best way to do that for me is to keep a list of essentials and refer back to that list to make sure I haven’t missed anything.  I think I created the list fifteen or twenty years ago and still use it today.  I made the list originally, because we went on a cruise and we forgot Rich’s watch and a clock, so when we were in our room, we never knew what time it was.  On cruises, everything is scheduled, so we had to buy a clock once we got to port.  It was one of those things that we just couldn’t make it without and I hate buying things I don’t really need.  If I didn’t have the list, I’m sure I would forget just about everything important (including my passport.)

The other time saver I use is keeping all of my toiletries packed at all times.  It’s saved us on numerous occasions when we had family emergencies and had to leave almost immediately.  At the end of each trip, I just make sure I add back anything that we ran out of on that particular trip and that way I don’t have to check the bag before we go anywhere the next time.

I’m off to craft.  So much to do and so little time.  Funny how I always seem to have too much to do when time is short.  I think I must procrastinate.  Or else I just pack too much in when I have a small amount of time to do it in.  Either way, I should come up with a plan that doesn’t involve so much last minute activity, yikes!

.

I bought several frames at the Dollar Tree and paper from Joanns, plus some paper from my stash.  The first frame I used my Zig 2 Way glue pen and some red glitter to make the paper a lot more shiny and make it appear more expensive.  I had a bunch of glittery snowflakes and put one in the top left corner and one in the bottom right corner of the 8 x 10″ frame (from Salvation Army) and put the frame together without any glue to hold the snowflakes in place.  They haven’t moved since I put them inside.  I glued the big red deer head to the outside of the glass.  The second frame is a 5 x7″ and has a Dollar Tree Christmas card in it.  I cut the card at the score line and put it in the frame with some scotch tape to make sure it didn’t move.  (I broke the glass on this frame while I was putting it back together, so it doesn’t have any glass, but I don’t think it made a big difference on its look because the card is so shiny.)  The third frame  I used a black piece of cardstock that I cut to 8 x 10″ and had a roll of glittery tulle that I bought at the Dollar Tree last year and I measured to make sure it was centered and ran the tulle the length of the black paper and taped it in place.  I put the frame together then glued a silver deer to the front.  The fourth frame was square (about 10 1/2″) and I cut paper to size and then laid snowflakes in the top right and bottom left corners and put the frame back together.  This is the only frame that doesn’t stand on its own and hangs on the wall or sits on a stand.  The fifth frame is a 5 x7″ with a mat in it.  I decided to glitter the paper again with my Zig glue pen and white sparkly Martha Stewart glitter.  It’s hard to see on the video, but it adds a great shine to the paper.  I put the paper inside the frame and left the matt in place and taped the paper to the back of the matt.  I  put a pearl in the top of the tree ornament to cover the hole that you would hang the ornament from, and glued it to the front of the glass.
I could have made a lot more as it was so much fun and I really encourage you to try these.  They are inexpensive and make a terrific gift.  I had the snowflakes in my stash and the total cost per frame was under $3 each including the paper, frame and ornaments..The snowman ornament came from Joanns and was the most expensive at $2.10 and the red deer came from a store called Peebles and was $1.99.  I bought the frame that I put it in at Salvation Army for 79 cents.  The rest of the frames and ornaments came from the Dollar Tree.  The Dollar Tree had a lot more really cute ornaments and frames that would be perfect for this gift.  I just bought a couple more frames yesterday at the Dollar Tree and they mentioned that often the glass is cracked on the edges and that I should keep my receipt and they would replace them for me if it happened.

I went to A C Moore tonight and took back the Aleene’s glue gun that I had a couple meltdowns over on the Christmas wreath ornament video.  I really try not to go crazy on video, but that glue gun was a nightmare.  They were so nice about it, when I told them I couldn’t physically get it to work, they apologized and took it back.  Great customer service!  I went looking for my old mini glue gun and haven’t been able to find it so I bought a really cute one for $2.50.  You have to love a price like that!

Tomorrow will be a busy crafting day as it’s my last full day at home before our vacation in St. Maarten.  I need to make the mini album and fill the Christmas balls with scented bath salts and decorate the outsides of the balls with some new 3-d gold “outliner” I think it’s called.  I saw Lindsay use this gold product on a Smart Art Box video and decided it would be really cute on Christmas clear balls as a decoration.  I’m going to give it a try tomorrow so I’ll let you know how it goes.

I needed to make a second Christmas mini album for one of my girlfriends for Christmas, so tomorrow is as good a time as any, so others will have time to make their albums as well.  I went to the Dollar Tree tonight to see if they still had the Christmas treat bags and both Dollar Trees within fifty miles of me still have them.  If my stores have them, they should be everywhere, as my stores aren’t the greatest. although I have been to ones that are definitely worse than mine.

Rich is going to make sure we have a couple of videos that will go up while we are away so it doesn’t seem like I’ve fallen off the Earth for a week.  I’ll try to stay current with everything but the blog.  I won’t be writing anything after this Wednesday.  We’ll be home on the 15th, but late, so I won’t blog until the 16th.  I plan on making at least one video while I’m there to show the scenery and discuss the island in general.  It should be a lot of fun and I’m really looking forward to the trip and making the video of the island.

I’m happy that Rich has been sticking to his promise to put up one video a day for a week.  It’s really allowing us to get to the point that when I talk about a video, it comes online within a few days.  The thing that makes me crazy is when I have an idea about a video and it takes weeks for it to go online.  We still have a video of the child’s chair that I converted into a planter that never went online.  It’s kind of too late to do it now, since who would be interested in a planter in December?  Maybe they would, but I think it might be a better video in the spring.  It focuses on all of the spring, summer and fall seasons, but not winter, so it would be out of context now, in my opinion.

I do have so many other videos, both finished and unfinished.  I’m waiting to do a haul on all of the crafty things I bought over good Friday.  I have a friend who told me that I might not get all of the things I bought until mid December.  That’s kind of a bummer, because some of the things I’ve bought are for Christmas projects.  And who is interested in Christmas things in January?

This might make you laugh.  I’ve been writing a blog post every day for almost a year.  I write it on a laptop that I believe may be possessed by the devil.  Sometimes I’ll write several paragraphs and somehow I’ll accidentally push something and delete all  or most of what I’ve just written.  It’s happened so many times and I’ve gotten used to rewriting what’s been lost.  Tonight it happened again and I thought “I’ll figure out a way to fix this or give up on writing tonight.”  Maybe it was my total commitment to giving up, but I looked all over my computer and finally found an undo button.  Do you know how many times I’ve looked for the undo button?  Crazy, and frustrating all at the same time.  I’m so relieved that I now know what to do, and I could kick myself for not looking harder before today.  Geez, what a waste of time.  I should have just asked Rich for help and he would have pointed to the undo key and said, “Press that.”:  It’s so easy for some and so difficult for others.  I’m one of the others, obviously.

 

If you read my blog, you’ll remember the meltdown I had when I made this ornament.  It was all glue gun related–I bought the Aleene’s Palm Feed Glue Gun and I hated it.  I could not use it with one hand and if you have any problems with strength in your hands, this is not the glue gun for you.  I used it on the low setting and that could have been part of my problem, but in general, the glue gun is too big and cumbersome.  I definitely prefer my cheap mini glue gun to the Aleene’s gun.  I showed this gun in a haul and said I would do a full review on it, but I won’t be doing one as it would be a waste of your time.  It is not something you should consider if you have hand strength issues.

For this project, you’ll need:
-a Styrofoam circle or wreath form, 3″ was the size I used.
-hot glue gun (not the one I used, obviously!) and glue sticks
-green ribbon to surround the wreath
-decorations for on the wreath (mini pearls, charms, old earrings, whatever you like.  My charm information is below.
-ribbon to surround the outside of your wreath (if you want to do this, it’s optional.)
-wet glue
-Martha Stewart five leaf and medium branch punches.
-Three colors of green card stock so the bundles look more dimensional.  Punch 100 or more of the pine (called a branch punch by Martha Stewart) in three green colors and 25 of the leaf punch for on the back of your bundles.  I just bought the pine punch on ebay for under $10 and the item number is 112112737375 and the seller has more available.
Lindsay, the Frugal Crafter made a real pine wreath and made bundles.  I fashioned my bundles after hers although I didn’t need to wire mine together. Here’s a link to her video.

Start with two leaves on the back spread like a fan and add wet glue to them so they stick together, and then start gluing different colors of the pine pieces so the ends are all in the same place but the tops of the pine go in different directions, so you create a fan looking bundle.  In the end, you’ll need between 12-15 bundles.  I put a big dollop of wet glue on my craft mat and dipped the pieces in the glue to make it easier. Then, after gluing my bundles together, I laid them on the mat to dry.  I used hot glue to attach them to the wreath.
I took an old earring of a snowman and straightened the wire on it and shoved it into the Styrofoam at the top of my wreath and glued it with hot glue to keep it there.  I did this after I wrapped the Styrofoam in green ribbon and before I put the greenery on it.
I used my bow jig to make the bow with white sheer ribbon.   If you don’t have a bow jig, you can make your own and I’ll link the video I made to show you how, or you can find them on Ebay.  Here is the item number for one that makes up to a 6″ bow and as small as 1/2″ bow.  Item number 140916315881.  Put the number in the search box at the top and the bow jig should appear.  It’s $7.99 with no shipping.   There are others that are less expensive, but they don’t make as big of a bow.  Lindsay’s (The Frugal Crafter)husband also makes bow jigs and they sell them through her site.
The small silver charms I also bought on ebay and here are the item numbers for them.  Pinecones were $1.70 for 20 of them and the item number is  252295624718.  I bought 100 snowflakes for $4.35 and their item number is 252220441935 and I got 30 bells for $3.25 and they were by far the nicest.  Their item number is 262527630894.  All of them came from overseas so they won’t be here in time for this Christmas, but definitely are worth the money.
I hope you like this ornament, I thought it turned out really well considering the problems I had when I started.