Things With Wings

Studio Visit

2012-01-31T10:09:00.000-06:00

My studio was a bit straightened up - for a brief moment - last week, when we invited a group from our oldest son's boyscout troop to finish up their art merit badge by visiting an artist's studio or workshop. Showed them a bit about what I do and how I do it. One boy even knew what mod podge was from an art project he'd done at school! The others just kind of stared at me. But that's ok.

This week the table is crammed full of stuff again.

-jill

Happy Family.

2012-01-27T13:23:00.021-06:00

Here is a fun family project for you! About four years ago, I sat my family down and handed out paper and pencils and had everyone draw a "self portrait" of themselves. Those portraits were proudly framed and hang in our hallway. We (and everyone who visits) have enjoyed them the past few years (they are GREAT conversation pieces!), but I noticed that they had gotten quite outdated as the kids have gotten much older and may see themselves a little differently. So, we decided to update our own portraits. This time they got a wood panel and a sharpie marker and then I followed up with my craft paint. The main thing I stress during this activity is "DON'T TAKE YOURSELF TOO SERIOUSLY!" Because lets face it. Some people in this house are artists.....and some are CPA's. And that's great! So without further ado....let me introduce you to my family.....You probably all recognize this lady. She's me. And this artist's rendering is true to life. I love the color green and love things that have wings. Enough about me. Moving right along.....

This is my handsome husband. He's a CPA. He rocks the tie most days. He's "all business" during the day, but we all know he has a wicked devilish sense of humor. He's my complete opposite and the complete love of my life. God knew what he was doing when he put Joe and Laura together.

This is my oldest son, Jackson. He's 15. He's super smart. Like crazy wicked smart. He has long surpassed me in smartness. If you're playing board games you should try and get on his team. He plays the drums and loves his Mt. Dew. He's a respectful guy and is just all around cool. He makes me really proud.

This is my middle son, Noah. He is 10. He is the king of one-liners. He makes me laugh every single day. His life is complete, now that the Patriots are going to the SuperBowl. He is going to play baseball for the Chicago Cubs when he grows up and said he is going to fly his Mom to all his games. He is a mini-Joe in almost every way, so I know he is going to turn into an amazing man someday.
This is Lily Margaret. She is 6 and is precious. She is girly in this house full of boys. She likes to color and she likes to shop. She is shy but will attack and try to take down her brothers if the need arises. She is creative and has a wonderful imagination. She wants to be a Mom when she grows up.

...and this is the "beloved" family dog, Cookie. She is 6 years old and I'm just now starting to like her. She's growing on me. At least she's not one of those poo-eaters.

There you have it, everything you wanted to know and more about our family. I encourage you to try this with your family. It will be fun! And remember...you don't have to be an artist.....just have fun and laugh at yourself!

Linked to Flamingo Toes, Tatertots and Jello and Be Different Act Normal.

Good Day Sculpture Winner!

2012-01-26T22:13:00.001-06:00

The winner of the Good Day sculpture is.....

Kathy!
who said this, "Today is a good day because it's a gift - the present ;) Jesus made this day so it's a good one!"

Big congrats!

The winner was chosen randomly by the Random Number Generator.

If any of you are interested in purchasing your own flower sculpture, you can find it for online purchase at Cranberry Junction Gifts. Or you can find a retailer in your area by visiting the store locator. (You'll have to check with individual shops to determine whether they have this specific piece.)

Kathy also wins this original house ornament too because she was kind enough to share our giveaway with her facebook friends.

Thanks to everyone who shared a shiny moment of their day with us. It felt like a privilege to get to spend a little piece of our day together!

We'll take a teeny, tiny break from the giveaways, but we do have more stuff to hand out -there's even a rumor that one of them might be a Lazy Susan (ooooooh!!!) so keep on coming back to visit!

Good Day Giveaway!

2012-01-24T07:00:00.003-06:00

***THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED!

See, I told you we'd be doing another one very, very soon!

Who knows what could happen today....oh, the possibilities!

...In any case, we know that every day is a good day for a giveaway! See, you're already heading in the right direction!

The giveaway is for our Good Day sculpture from "This Thing Called Family!"

It sits 10 inches high and is made from metal and wood composite. It encourages you to view each new day with optimism and hope.

If you can't wait to see if you've won this guy and want your own NOW, go check out Cranberry Junction Gifts, where this flower can be purchased online!

Rules:

One entry per person. Tell us what's good about YOUR day today. Also mention, in your one comment, if you've shared on facebook to win an extra prize!*

Leave a way to contact you, or we'll have to choose somebody else!

Winner will be chosen by random number generator on Thursday night, Jan 26 at 10pm CST.

*If you share on facebook,
(it's easy: click on the "f" facebook button at the bottom of this post)
you'll win this EXTRA PRIZE:

original home {happy} home 7 inch ornament

Good Luck, and go make today amazing!

PS: A few new items were added to the etsy shop yesterday. It no longer stands empty!

Winner!

2012-01-23T22:11:00.000-06:00

The winner of our "Hold Hands" wall art from This Thing Called Family is....

Elisabet!!
(We used the random number generator, which chose #50, to pick our winner.)

She said this:
"I love all of your pieces! I have a few and would love to add this to my collection. I would hang this in my master bedroom. Thanks!"

Elisabet, email us at paperprayers@hotmail.com -along with your mailing address to claim your prize!
Congratulations, Elisabet!!!!

Since Elisabet did not leave a way to contact her, we will choose a new winner for this prize if we don't hear from her by Wednesday night.

And as promised, we'll start another giveaway very, very soon!!!

***PS: SIX new items were added to the Paper Prayers Etsy shop today! Go check it out!

Snow Day Giveaway!

2012-01-20T14:16:00.004-06:00

**THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED!

Just because it's snowing here in Iowa and the kids all got out 2 hours early, let's have a giveaway!

These lovebirds are from "This Thing Called Family!" This piece of wall art is 10x20 and has a dimensional metal tree and birds. It's based on a version of the custom orders that we do, but this one you can purchase right from retailers! Makes an awesome wedding, engagement, anniversary or Valentine's gift. It can be purchased online from Cranberry Junction Gifts.

One entry per person. Tell us what you'd do with this piece if you won it and be sure to leave us a way to contact you. *Tell us too, in your one comment, if you shared it on facebook!

*If you share this post on facebook, I'll throw in this friendly little owl block (just like the ones I gave out as teacher gifts,) who's rooting for you:

Really, he's cheering you on inside. Don't let the look on his face fool you.

**The easiest way to share this giveaway on facebook is to click on the "f" facebook button in the green rectangle at the end of this post.

We'll choose a winner Monday night, Jan 23, around 10pm CST.

Winner will be chosen randomly and will not be dependent on your answer! (We only asked what you'd do with it because we're nosy like that!)

Maybe then we'll start ANOTHER giveaway right away!

Did That All REALLY Just Happen??!!

2012-01-19T08:00:00.003-06:00

One of our new sets! -This Thing Called Family

Thursday night of the Atlanta Market, Demdaco invited us to a meet and mingle event where we got to connect + express our gratitude to the business owners that carry our line. We are so thankful to them all!!! They have so many awesome products to choose from at market. It's humbling that anybody ever picks ours.

Business owners "shop" TTCF + place their orders. Sales reps use handheld devices to scan the products they choose.

We also had the privilege of meeting some other artists and designers - some of whom we've been fans of for a long time, others who are now our new favorites! Meeting these artists was a totally surreal experience. These are successful women who have made a name for themselves....at least in our little art world :-) - and they're all a few steps ahead of us in this journey. These are people who we admire because of their creativity and passion. They've worked hard and actively pursued their goals to make a success and a living at this whole art thing. And then here we are, having stumbled our way into this licensing gig. (Demdaco found us! How often does THAT happen?!) We're just regular moms first, who are so very fortunate to be in a position where we can do what we love to do, as much or as little as we want, or as our time allows. It's just our way of expressing ourselves and being a blessing to others.

New! This Thing Called Family

Anyway, I was a little intimidated to meet this group of artists. I thought I'd come away feeling like I'd rubbed elbows with the "rich and famous." I'd put these women on a pedestal as these unachievably perfect, totally together, successful people who I could never be like. I don't know why I thought this way - it wasn't anything they did or didn't do. I guess it's just what you tend to do when you only know someone from facebook and blog world!

New! This Thing Called Family

INSTEAD, as I met and visited with these artists, I quickly realized something. They're real people. Genuine, honest-to-goodness, real, down-to-earth people! And I don't say that to minimize any of their achievements because they STILL have our undying admiration and we're STILL big fans of their work. But these gals are more like us than I ever thought they would be! They get nervous doing stuff like this. They have goofy senses of humor or are self-proclaimed dorks - just like us! They are content to work on top of their washer and dryer - just like Green Girl works at her kitchen island - because THAT'S WHAT YOU DO: ya work with whatchya got. They worry about how they'll manage to balance family and art too. They feel all the same pulls and don't always know what to do about it, don't always make the right choice, but they give themselves a little grace and they re-prioritize and somehow it all ends up OK. They admire our artwork as much as we admire theirs. They felt like instant friends. There were no egos involved or competition. Just authenticity and mutual admiration of kindred spirits. I know it sounds cheesy. But GOOD cheesy. That's really how it felt! I know we've begun a connection from here on out that is more than hitting the "like" button on their latest status updates. I'm already looking forward to future face to face visits and to rooting for them in all their artistic endeavors.

The first artist we met by venturing out of the Demdaco showroom to her very own brand new space in the Darrah&Co. showroom. Her name is Michelle Allen:

She's the artist behind Allen Designs. We love her spirit! You can visit her blog and website to see her playful, colorful art. We're big fans of her owls, clocks and soap spitters! She has her own little team of employees, develops products to be manufactured + ships from her warehouse/studio. It's been so interesting and a lot of fun to watch her journey.

Another high point: meeting artist Marjolein Bastin. From Holland to the US, her detailed nature artwork has connected with people all over the world through her partnerships with Demdaco and Hallmark. Plus our grandma, Mamma Winger's mom, has always been a huge fan. So this was a special moment for Connie! AND us girls grew up reading + loving Vera the Mouse, which she created! Thanks for sharing such special pieces of wisdom with us, Marjolein! http://www.marjoleinbastin.com/en


Connie (caught in a tearful moment) and Marjolein.

Here we are with our product developer at Demdaco - Kate (it's been a blast working with her - she's full of great ideas!) and Holly Christine the artist behind Colorful Devotions.

Connie, Kate, Laura, Holly, Jill

Go check out Holly's website to find out more about her - she's super nice! It felt like we already knew each other - just that indescribable 'somethin' - I'm pretty sure that's got something to do with Jesus. :-) She sells many of her own products on her website, so we got to pick her brain about what that's like. Sounds like a lot of work!


Holly's line, Colorful Devotions, was displayed in such a fun and colorful way in the Demdaco showroom!

Another artist that was a complete surprise to meet was Jessica Swift. It's a good thing that we all had badges with our names on them. We didn't know that she's currently working with Demdaco on a line for January of 2013! But we did recognize her name from her badge. (We follow her blog and facebook page.) My opening line was, "Hey!!! Where are your rainboots?! You're not wearing any!" I'm subtle like that. But seriously, go check her out - she's a very talented surface designer and artist who has the greatest pattern and color sense.

Holly, Connie, Jessica, Laura, Jill

We laughed our butts off with artist Cindy Wunsch of Studio Be. We knew right away we were going to like her because she just tells it like it is. And with her southern accent, she totally pulls it off! She has a studio in Nashville where she teaches classes + invites other artists to come teach as well. She asked us if we'd ever be interested in teaching a class.....

Connie, Cindy, Laura, Jill

Cindy's line is brand new this year and the showroom staging for it was wonderful - she even got one of the window displays!

Studio Be

It was a long time dream to meet Kelly Rae Roberts. The success of her collection with Demdaco paved the way for other original mixed media artists and sent Demdaco soaring into a new, pioneering, creative direction. Now they are working with all kinds of mixed media artists with unique stories to tell. We're just excited to be a teeny tiny part of it and to witness and root for the journeys of other artists. We just knew that our paths would cross someday and it finally happened!

Here's just a small portion of the stunning KRR vignettes in the showroom:

More and more of us artists began coming together to visit (I think we have some kind of creative force field) until finally THIS happened:

There are 5 ladies in this picture above that I have not mentioned yet. And although we only got to meet them briefly, we're just as big of fans of their work!

In the back left hand corner is Lori Siebert. She is the designer of the very successful glassware line Sylvestri Glass Fusion.

Next to her in the back is Megan Halsey who created the line Farm Fresh - a line of giftware with a Farmer's Market/Organic theme.

In the front left hand corner is Caroline Simas. She is so sweet! Her new line, Multiple Blessings, debuted at this market and it's so fun and colorful!

Next to Caroline is Sharon Feldstein. She is the creator of Story Squares - a colorful collection of toppers and squares that you can mix and match to tell your own story with art.

Last in the picture, but certainly not least, is Leigh Standley, over in the back, right hand corner. She is THE Curly Girl! This gal has a great sense of humor + a unique voice that shines through in her work. She owns a shop in the Boston area called Marmalade. We were so excited when she told us that she carries some of TTCF in her shop!!!

If you take time to visit all of these ladies sites, you'll quickly see that they've ALL got a LOT more going on than the lines I mentioned - they're busy doing all kinds of amazing things all over the place!
What a lot of talent and accomplishments all squished together into one photograph! It's amazing that my camera didn't catch on fire!

One final highlight to mention was meeting Susan Lordi earlier in the day, but somehow we forgot to get a picture!!! She is the creator of Willow Tree and was one of the first artists to begin creating for Demdaco in 1999. She helped shape it into one of the top companies in the gift industry today. She shared a bit about her philosophy and process behind creating each sculpture. Each piece is personal + conveys a feeling or emotion. She hand-carves each original, then a mold is taken from her original. It was a pleasure to meet Susan! Here's a picture of part of the Willow Tree display in the Atlanta showroom:

That night, after meeting all of these gorgeous people, we laid in our hotel beds (Mamma Winger and I ended up sharing the king and Green Girl got the roll-away because she's a major blanket hog who won't share - I know you were all wondering who ended up where.....And did you know that the Four Seasons only has rooms with either 2 twin - yes - TWIN beds, or 1 king? There are no rooms with 2 doubles! Weird, huh?) Anyway, we laid in our king bed and our roll-away and we said to each other, "Did that all REALLY just happen???!!!"

New! This Thing Called Family

We are so, so, SO grateful to be a part of this Demdaco family!

New! This Thing Called Family

*Special big thanks to Jonathan, Cultural Conversation Leader at Demdaco, who asked us what we'd like to get out of being in Atlanta and when we said 'meet some other artists,' went out of his way to introduce us to several people we wouldn't have otherwise met!

Atlanta Market + Demdaco, 2012

2012-01-17T08:00:00.004-06:00

We are still experiencing the after effects of spending time away from home. It's always a bit of shock to come back to our real lives! Especially when you splurge and stay at the Four Seasons! Can we be real though? We were a bit out of our element! We're used to staying at places where you get a free continental breakfast and there is no tipping of any kind involved! We don't normally stay at places that offer evening turn down services or have bathrobes or have restaurants that lay your napkin in your lap for you and cause you to doubt the language the menu is in, because you don't recognize anything on it! But by the time we decided to go, rooms were scarce that were anywhere close to the AmercasMart. We knew that at least this hotel was close to MARTA (or "Martha" as we affectionately like to call her) which would get us everywhere we needed to go. So we went for it! Somehow we were upgraded to a Terrace room!

The market itself is huge. I mean like overwhelming humongous. It was our first time at the Atlanta market, last year we went to the Chicago version, which we thought was big, but it's not nearly on the same scale as Atlanta! There are 3 buildings like this:

Floor and more floors. FULL of merchandise. With this many choices, it's a wonder that anyone ever finds or picks our line to carry in their store! It's kinda crazy.

DEMDACO invited us to a special mingle event on Thursday night where their customers and artists could meet. We had the opportunity to meet and thank many business owners who carry our line, many of whom we recognized through connecting on facebook! Some even wanted to take our picture with our display. Surreal. General feedback was that the lazy susans, family rules, and welcome sign have all been good sellers for people and so have the small winged plaques.

Everyone at Demdaco had such nice things to say about "This Thing Called Family" too. They are so excited about how it's first year went and are very optimistic about its future! We met many new sales reps, saw many familiar faces from our previous visit to Kansas City headquarters and got to visit more extensively with the product developers for our line. They got us all pumped up about 2 more releases later this year of TONS more awesome new things to TTCF, plus thinking ahead to 2013! We can't wait to get started on designs for 2013. We've got so many ideas that it's going to be a challenge to narrow it down! Guess that's a good problem to have!

The Demdaco showroom is huge! Here's some pictures of our display:

6 new sets of phrases

The three on the left are new!

Some close ups of more new crosses:

New owl nesting dolls

New Look What I Made, magnetic board

New Share, Spend, Save set

New Perpetual Calendar -Alleluia! Doesn't it look like it has a halo?!

New Step Stool!

We can't tell you enough how much we enjoy the atmosphere at Demdaco. They are genuine and friendly. They are all about people and building relationships - both internally and with their retailers. They are concerned about creating something that is meaningful and lasting: in spirit, in business and in products. They made us feel right at home, when we are so clearly still new at this. Wandering around the showroom and overhearing sales reps as they talked to customers, it's easy to see why Demdaco is rated #1 in customer service for the whole gift industry!

*Next time we'll share pictures and stories of all of the talented artists that we had the pleasure and honor to meet!

"Beauty Shots"

2012-01-10T17:51:00.001-06:00

Not gonna lie, we're freaking out a little bit over the cuteness of these photos that Demdaco just sent us. Guess they call them "beauty shots!" You gotta love that!

Well these are some of the "beauties" that are new this month to "This Thing Called Family." We're going to get to see all of the new items in Atlanta - we're leaving tomorrow!!

Pictured here are three of the new wall art sets (there's 6 sets total, with a color palette for everybody!) and perched on top, our new set of owl nesting dolls!

3 sets of wall art and owl nesting dolls

Below is our new "Look What I Made" magnetic board and "Share, Spend, Save" set.

The magnetic board is a fun way to display your child's latest masterpiece! The words "Look What I Made" are on a long magnet to tack the artwork up. The fun thing about this piece is that it's easy to trade out the artwork and you could hang it vertically or horizontally - depending on the orientation of the artwork!

The set of share, spend and save containers are so cute with their polka-dotted knobs! They say, "Share (with others.)" "Save, (just in case.)" and Spend (a little for fun.) Good for kids or for the entire family!

"Look What I Made" magnetic board and "Share, Spend, Save" set.

So excited to share these fun pictures with you. Even more excited to go see it all in person in the showroom and visit with customers, artists, and our Demdaco friends!

I'm sure we'll have stories and pictures galore for you when we get back!

Happy Creative, Courageous New Year!

2012-01-09T17:20:00.001-06:00

With the start of a new year, Laura aka Green Girl, was asked to create a special version of her "Creativity Takes Courage" quote for our line developer at Demdaco to give to the creative team she works with.

all wrapped up and ready for 2012!

The tag reads, "A new year, a fresh start, a wonderfully inspiring piece of art!"

The product development team has some of the most talented and creative people around and they work hard to make "This Thing Called Family" and many other lines a success! They've taken some courageous, creative risks in their time - moving in a new direction in recent years to work with a variety of original + inspiring mixed media artists who have unique and wonderful things to say and offer. (You can see a list of many of the artists and links to their sites on the Demdaco facebook page under "The Artists." ) Not only are the authentic voices of some great artists now being heard, but it's resonating with people, and they are responding + connecting to the artwork and gifts on a scale and in a way that is truly remarkable + humbling. These relationships between Demdaco, their artists and the public are changing the gift-giving industry! The future is looking good - we're so happy + humbled to be just a teensy part of it!

So we say to all of you readers and to all of our friends at Demdaco - Happy New Year, and keep on being your courageous selves!

adorning a desk at Demdaco

"Creativity Takes Courage," can now be found on one of our phrase blocks, released this month and showing up in stores soon! Read a bit more about them here.

Sneak Peek at our holiday open house!

Mirror.

2012-01-06T10:45:00.005-06:00

I had the honor of being commissioned to create this mirror for a fundraiser for one of our fine Iowa City Schools. Being a private catholic school, they rely on fundraising for their operating costs. This piece will be part of their silent auction. As a part of the auction, each grade comes up with an item to auction off. My friend, Celine, asked me to create this for the 5th grade classes and incorporate all of the kids' names. They signed little slips of paper and they became part of the artwork! I'm loving how this turned out and hoping it raises some money for them!

The Atlanta Gift Market is Next Week!

2012-01-06T06:00:00.002-06:00

Here's a sneak peek video of new products that are debuting with Demdaco this month! There are a few glimpses of the new items for "This Thing Called Family" around 1:43! You can see LOTS more pics of our 2012 products, including our super cute owl nesting dolls, (sooo excited!) in this post.

We are preparing to go to Atlanta next week to see all of these new lovely products in person and hopefully meet some of the talented artists behind these lines! We'll be hanging out at the International Gift and Home Furnishings Market January 12th and 13th.

This is an event held several times a year, but January's is always the biggest! Retailers from all over the country come to 'market' to shop wholesale. They decide what they want to carry in their stores for that season or that year and put in their orders. All kinds of gift and home decor companies exhibit their products. There are several buildings and floors + floors of market to see. Demdaco's "showroom" itself is HUGE! When you consider how many wonderful choices retailers have, it's truly amazing that anyone ever picks our line! We can't wait to see the displays and the creative staging of our favorite Demdaco collections. We're also excited to see our favorite Demdaco people- the creative team of people who continue to work so hard to develop our line, "This Thing Called Family." ALSO, we are thrilled by the possibility of meeting and connecting with some of our favorite Demdaco artists!

We'll try to take lots of pictures so we can show you everything when we return.

*If you're a retailer, artist (or just some other random person :-) who is going to the Atlanta market next week, let us know!!!

*And hey, if you're a pro and go every year, give us newbees some tips! We could use all the help we can get! :-)

Year End Wrap Up

2011-12-31T23:11:00.001-06:00

Holly Jolly, By Golly!

Our trees were full of handmade Things With Wings ornaments!

We sure hope you had a great Christmas! Ours was full of lots of family time, lots of good food, lots of new toys, lots of game playing, and lots of special handmade gifts!

The youngest Winger Emily was here from Austin for 2 weeks! We talked a lot, laughed a lot, ate a lot and relaxed a lot. For Christmas she gave us our very own copies of the new Austin Stone Live Worship album! If you haven't heard it yet, go take a listen for yourself - you'll want to buy it! They have a new website too, with a ton of awesome resources. One of the best things about the website is that you can watch the hour long album release celebration any time you want to. That's our Emily over on the left side of the stage with the look of pure joy on her face. I KNOW she's really going to appreciate that I've captured this screen shot of her :-)

If you're on facebook much, you may have already seen some of the handmade gifts that we gave each other for Christmas. Green Girl made us framed yarn-wrapped letters. She painted the frame, added the background, and wrapped paper mache letters:

and painted leather cuff bracelets. She cut the leather, added snaps, and painted each one in a fun, unique way:

Mamma Winger made us unique artwork from a vintage dictionary and stamped letters printed on canvas.

To wrap up 2011, we thought we'd investigate what our most popular posts from this past year were. These blog entries were our top viewed blog posts and/or top pinned images from Pinterest.

1. Teacher Gifts, December 20, 2011 This was our top viewed post due to the explosion of new visitors brought our way via Craftgawker! In this post I shared the inexpensive and easy teacher Christmas gifts I made from a 2x4 plank of wood.

2. My New Wall, August 15, 2011 In this post Green Girl Laura shared her entryway welcome wall created from a variety of frames in her collection. We all LOVE and can relate to its honest message! And it's so much fun for it to be one of the first things guests see when they enter her home. The majority of our blog visitors to this post came from Pinterest.

This welcome message has been very popular and also appears in our top selling "This Thing Called Family" piece! Guess a lot of people can relate!

3. New Creative Works by Connie (Mamma Winger), May 24, 2011 In this post, Connie, aka Mamma Winger, shared a multitude of amazing new pieces that she had ready for our spring art shows, but the image that caught everyone's eye and created the most buzz was her "ABC's of life" - that baby is still ALL OVER Pinterest!

sold

It was very interesting to investigate our top viewed posts of the year and the referring traffic sources. By FAR and away, Pinterest has brought us the most traffic this year. It's made a huge difference in the number of visitors we get. Thanks, Pinterest! You can follow our boards here: http://pinterest.com/thingswithwings Leave your link in the comments if you'd like us to follow you!

So now it's on to 2012... this is a time of looking back at what we've learned from 2011 and a time of looking forward to all the good things sure to come in 2012! Are you making any resolutions?

We wish you all a safe and happy new year! See ya on the flipside! :-)

Gifts with wings

2011-12-30T11:49:00.003-06:00

Momma Winger reporting in! ok, I know, I know. . . I can't take photographs worth a crap.....we all know that, right? So bear with us on this one. I just had to show off the Things with Wings gifts I got for Christmas. The multi-colored "Make Today Count" sign with the handy dandy purple hook on it was made by Jill. Is it cute or what? I need to hang it in just the right spot where I will be sure to gaze upon it every morning and contemplate what extraordinary thing I could do that day. . . . hmmmmmm. . . . for sure! But I love it - the wonderful colors - and the depth of thought that 3 small words can convey. The other piece was made by Laura. The letter "B"(for Berends) in this painted frame which is a piece of art in and of itself. So cute. The "B" is wrapped in yarn. I love that soft and hard are combined and complement each other. It's hanging in my dining area right beside my Christine Mason Miller "Be an Artist" piece by DEMDACO. OH! back to Laura - Green Girl - she does wonderful things in ALL colors! I also got another very special gift from daughter #3! Gonna save that for another post. In the meantime I hope you can imagine how great these pieces are in real life in spite of my lack of talent in the photo department!

Teacher Christmas Gifts

2011-12-20T15:38:00.005-06:00

Today was the last day of school for our kids before winter break! Are you ready?!

Here's a peek at Christmas gifts I made for the various teachers in our boys' lives. These wise old owls say,

"Do your best. *BE your best."

I chose this message because I thought it was a great encouragement to both teachers and students. (We have a friend who is a school guidance counselor who loved this message for her office - so I knew other teachers would appreciate it as well.)

On the back of each art block I wrote a personal message, thanking each teacher for how they bring out the best in their students. We are so blessed to have phenomenal teachers in the ICCSD who care deeply about our kids. This small token of our appreciation doesn't nearly measure up to the hard work and dedication that these people show on a daily basis.

*UPDATE: with all of the recent traffic from Craftgawker and subsequent questions about the process, I thought I'd tell you a bit more about how these were made. I bought an 8ft long 2x4 (Very inexpensive - only around $3!) at Menard's and had my husband cut them into 4in. increments. As a 2x4 is actually more like 3 1/2 inches wide, this made by blocks not quite square, but cutting was much easier, quicker + came out even that way. I painted the blocks in a variety of my favorite colors with craft acrylics, then created the owl from my patterned paper scraps and mod podge. Another layer of acrylics + sharpie marker were added for the owl details. Printed my quotes out and added those as well. Pretty easy, fast, and definitely inexpensive, as I had all the materials on hand, other than the 2x4. Just a small token of our appreciation, but meaningful!

Speaking of Craftgawker, we are so excited about all of the visitors it has brought our way recently! If you're new, we welcome you whole heartedly and hope you'll stick around awhile! Visit our About page to meet our artsy family, check out our line of "family values"-themed art and home decor items called "This Thing Called Family" and like our facebook page for lots of fun updates and goofiness!

I added fun, doodle-y lines to the sides of the blocks.

So now that the kids are home from school..... "quiet" is a thing of the past. Let the wild ruckus begin!

Did you make teacher gifts this holiday season? Leave us a comment - we're interested to hear about what you made!

If you blog, we'd love to see your post about teacher gifts you made too, so feel free to leave us the links so we can come and visit!

*Linking to Flamingo Toes!

We're Quirky Too!

2011-12-13T17:10:00.000-06:00

Today we're celebrating all of the wonderful quirky qualities that make you uniquely YOU!

If we're friends in real life, you may already be familiar with Jen Hatmaker - she spoke at our church's women's conference a few years back. Or you may be familiar with her because we've previously shared on facebook some of Jen's thoughts and posts as she experienced and then wrote the book Seven:

If you're not familiar with her books or her story, you can find out more here.

She recently wrote a very thought-provoking post on Christmas and how her family has chosen to give it back to Jesus. It's called the Christmas Conundrum and it may feel radical to some of you, but this may be just the very reason why by the time you get all of the shopping done, the presents wrapped, and the food baked, there is still this empty place inside you that usually results in what we call the Annual Christmas Cry.

So anyway, I just threw a lot of heavy stuff at you. And you can take it or leave it. Despite the challenging manner of the topics I just mentioned, Jen actually has an amazing and unique sense of humor! Now you're probably wondering where all this is going. The REAL reason for my post is actually much more trivial - and I mean that in the best sense of the word. :-)

Jen's latest blog post called "Quirky" reveals some of the unique idiosyncrasies that make her one of a kind. We all have those little neurotic tendencies. If you think you don't, you're not being honest with yourself! It's a very funny article, and the comments are hilarious too! I never knew that so many people had obsessions with numbers. I obviously don't. So in that same fashion, I thought I'd share a few of my "tendencies" and hope the other Wingers will join in. We'd love to hear some of yours too! So here goes:

-There is only one way to fold bath towels. You fold them in half, and then you fold that into thirds. My husband, bless his heart, had to learn this early on, and now folds them that way too. The reason: as a kid we had a linen closet tucked into a corner outside the bathroom. The unusually small and triangular space made our mother insist we fold the towels a certain way so that they would fit. I don't have a triangular closet, but old habits are hard to break.

-I don't like it when people are almost touching me. You might as well BE touching me. My sisters knew this growing up (and still occasionally even now) and would torture me by pointing their finger and hovering it inches over the bare skin on my arm or leg. I swear I can feel it. MO-OM, she's almost touching me!

-Now that we have a refrigerator with an ice maker, I am obsessed with crushed ice. I only use crushed ice for all of my drinks - juice, water, soda. Banana shaped ice cubes are too big, and they block the drink from getting to you. If my husband gets me a glass of something to drink, he knows to use crushed ice but rarely uses enough and I'll usually end up getting myself more. If I have filled up two glasses with ice for the two of us, I've for sure given myself more and if he takes the wrong one, he has to trade with me. I'm the opposite of all of those people on Jen's blog who said they can't stand the sound of someone eating ice. I crunch whole glass-fulls of ice. I know this isn't good for my teeth. I know it's probably annoying to listen to. I probably wouldn't want to listen to it either. But it's different when you're the one doing it. Even after the drink is gone I will sit and finish all of the ice in the glass before I'm done. I could go on and on about crushed ice. It's truly a passion of mine.

-I don't consider myself a knuckle cracker because I don't crack them the 'traditional' way. I do, however, crack them all together at the same time by pressing my fingers against my collar bone. I do this several times a day, and only with my left hand, (I'm left handed) never my right - that would just be weird. There's just something comforting about it. I associate it with how I sleep and rest - (another idiosyncrasy) usually with my left hand tucked into my neck. I've slept that way ever since I was little. My parents used to say that I must have been in the womb that way.

-There is only one right way to build a burger when you're preparing them at home. (In restaurants it doesn't matter.) This too, is an inherited trait that Mama Winger passed along to me. You put mustard and onion on the bottom bun, underneath your burger. Then your hamburger, cheese, ketchup and pickle on top of that. It doesn't taste the same assembled any other way. Try it, you'll see what I mean.

-In the days of sippy cups, (which we're thankfully out of now!) the matching colored lid HAD to go with the right cup. There was no mix matching allowed. I remember my brother-in-law was firmly with me on this one, but Green Girl could have cared less!

-here's a new one -just recently developed. I've got a complex about Christmas cards. This is the first year that we're not sending any out. It's so much money and for what? Something somebody's most likely going to throw away. I just don't see the point anymore. Nobody wants a picture of my family that they'll have to feel guilty about throwing away. (Or maybe they won't feel guilty.) Nobody cares to read a Christmas letter where we brag about ourselves. People who we're close to already know what we've been up to this year. I thought about doing a Christmas letter that brags about Jesus instead, but not everybody wants my sermon either. I used to be pretty proud about how many cards we'd get from other people. Hang them all up and display them proudly: look! see how popular we are? see how many friends we have?! But how many of those people do I actually talk to regularly? (It's kind of like being proud of how many facebook friends you have.) I've probably just offended someone who sent me a very nice, newsy card and watch, we won't get any this year! And then I'll feel like nobody likes me. So right now I have a pile of Christmas cards accumulating on my kitchen island that we've already received but I haven't opened them up yet. I don't know what to do with them. I almost feel... guilty about them. I totally appreciate getting them, but don't want to hang them up. See how neurotic this thing is getting?!

So anyway, those are just a few of my many, many quirks. I'm sure if you asked the other Wingers they could tell you many more things about me that make me, "me." I swear I'm not a freak.

Actually, I think it's way refreshing when people are real with each other. Especially people you look up to. I mean we are all so far from perfect. Isn't it comforting to realize that everybody's got their 'stuff' and you're not alone?! People who try to make you think that they are perfect only make it harder on themselves and all the rest of us by trying to obtain the impossible. It creates these crazy, unrealistic standards, steals your time and robs your joy. Why don't we all just be real instead?! So much easier, so much freedom!

So how 'bout it? Let's celebrate what makes each of us so fearfully and wonderfully made! What makes YOU quirky and special? Let's just pretend that these things only make us even more endearing to the people around us! :-)

Introducing NEW "This Thing Called Family" for 2012!!!

2011-12-07T10:25:00.002-06:00

We are so excited to introduce you today to the new pieces that will be coming out in January for "This Thing Called Family!"

We had our open house this past weekend, so we set up a little display of our favorites to give our friends a first look. We had to add another little sign saying, "Not for Sale!" because so many people wanted to scoop these up! I know, we're teasers!

The reason that we're so excited about these new pieces is because not only are they artful, so many of them are also USE-ful!

The piece below is a great way to display your kid's artwork. It's magnetic and can be used vertically or horizontally.

Set of share, spend and save boxes - helps kids make good choices with their money or can be used as a family for a common goal:

One of our new favorites - a magnetic perpetual calendar! There are unique magnets for each month to place in the sun, a rectangular magnet frame to put around the day of the week, and a circular magnet frame to move along for the date. There's a "pocket" to store the extra magnets and it says "Make today a good day." across the bottom. It seemed like there was a lot of buzz about the calendar at our open house...so we're thinking/hoping people will like it!

New crosses to add to the ones already in our collection! And there are more not pictured:

There are 6 sets of these phrases, made from separate word blocks. Each says something different and has its own unique color palette. The sides have fun designs on them and are wide enough that the blocks can stack on a shelf or mantle. These sets are versatile because they could ALSO be hung. You could hang them vertically - one word below the next or hang the words in a horizontal line. So they will fit lots of different spaces:

Another new favorite: a Nesting Owl family. These are gor-geous!!! The message is revealed one word at a time: "Make each day count." We think this set is going to be a big hit - we still get all silly over them!

So this is just a taste of what's coming out in January- it isn't everything!*

You can see all of the items in the original collection here: This Thing Called Family.

Did you notice anything about these new pieces?
...That's right, it's the color! We are thrilled to be adding more glorious colors to our line! It just makes us happy to look at and is so true to where we are in our art lives right now.

We're so glad to be able to finally share these new items with you. Secrets are so hard to keep!
*We'll show you the rest as soon as we see it ourselves!

So what do you think? Do you have a favorite?

*We'll have even more good stuff coming out in March and summertime next year that we can't reveal just yet, but we're even more excited about (if that's even physically possible!) because it holds a special place in our hearts!

TWW Holiday Open House 2012

2011-12-06T14:35:00.002-06:00

Our holiday open house was a big success, but man is it a lot of work!

The prep started last Wednesday night when Laura and her family moved all of their living room furniture to their garage.

During the day on Thursday we put up all of the Things With Wings artwork. Each piece was one of a kind!

Thursday afternoon and evening our friends came to set up their areas.

We had to be ready to go by Friday morning because we had some visitors from Demdaco who we spent the day with. They were able to see all of our newest designs in person and we brainstormed ideas for January 2013 and beyond! (We've already finished designs for products that will come out at 3 different times in 2012!)

Mamma Winger had 2 alphabets- both SOLD right away!

Adding Friday night hours to our open house this year was a very good idea. Our busiest times of the weekend were the first 2 hours Friday afternoon. Guess everyone wanted first picks!

Mamma Winger attached her ornaments to fabric this year to make garlands. All sold!

Green Girl's family is always happy to have their house back to normal by Saturday night! We're so grateful that they're so willing to give up their living space for a few days, help set up and put away AND disappear during show hours! That's asking a lot of them! So special thanks to all of Green Girl's family!

*Earlier I mentioned that we are brainstorming new formats, ideas and themes for the future of This Thing Called Family. We'd love to hear from YOU - what would you like to see us add to the collection? What are you looking for in giving gifts and/or for your own home? What item(s) do you like best in the current collection - should we add more? Let us know!

*Next post will be a FUN one: we'll show you a peek at the new products joining TTCF in January! Super exciting!

Congrats to our Giveaway Winners!

2011-12-06T08:00:00.002-06:00

Big-humongous-out-of-this-world thank-yous to all of you who came to our holiday open house this past weekend! We had a great time and hope you did too. The addition of Friday hours was a great success! Here are our giveaway winners:

Jacqueline Charlier won the Things With Wings sunshiny owl.
Tracy Mathews won the TTW heart hook.
Mary Lovetinsky won the TWW "welcome" sign.
Marylu Hoefer won the Icing on the Cake mittens.
Rae Mosier won the Girls' Intuition jewelry.

Congrats to all! Your artist should be contacting you soon, if they haven't already.

Here are some highlights from our weekend:

Fa La La!

entryway- a quick 'Relax' was added to the back of this bench for customers because Green Girl had nothing else to do:-)

Model Andrea from itti biti! Our favorite apron from itti biti has owls on it of course.

Lots of beautiful jewelry from Girls' Intuition.

Headbands with fabric flowers by Marnie of Icing on the Cake Accessories

Original paintings by Shadley Grimes on old windows. 2 out of 3 TWWers came home with a new one!

the cutest cake pops by Penny Pops


a BIG custom order created by Green Girl was delivered to a special soon-to-be mother. There were lots of happy tears!


the happy mother-to-be with Laura

A Things With Wings village on the mantle!

Next time we'll show you pictures of the Things With Wings set-up for the open house!

Austin Stone Live

2011-12-06T00:04:00.001-06:00

Hey Things With Wings people!

I don't ever post on the blog, but I'm the youngest sister of this family. Every once in awhile I'll get on here and post something...it usually has nothing to do with painting or crafting or any kind of artsy thing that my mom and my sisters do. I DID NOT get any of that talent! :)

BUT I am thankful that God gave me a different kind of talent and I wanted to share with you all some exciting news. The church that I lead worship for in Austin, Texas is releasing our first ever LIVE worship album!!!!

We are SO excited about this.

It is available on iTunes NOW!! GO GET IT!!
These are songs that we sing on Sundays and we are so excited that these songs will go outside the doors of our church and into the doors of homes across the world! For HIS glory!

One more exciting bit of news...
We are having a CD Release/worship night tonight, Tuesday, December 6th at 7:00pm CT. If you are in Austin come join us at The For the City Center OR... if you are not in Austin we will be streaming the night LIVE!! Go to our website, www.austinstoneworship.com to watch.

Another fun thing about our website is that it has a ton of resources. We have instructional videos for the songs, chord charts, the theology and story behind the song ... all kinds of things. So check that out too!

So thankful to be a part of this and to see Jesus be lifted up! He is so good.
For more information and updates you can check out my blog at www.emilywardmusic.blogspot.com

Last 3 Open House Giveaways are from Us!

2011-12-01T22:11:00.003-06:00

We can't believe that the Things With Wings holiday open house is almost here! We have 3 more giveaways to announce at the end of this post, and they're all from us! I don't think introductions are necessary...You've met us before. And you probably already know more about us than you ever wanted to. :-)

But first, here are a few details about our open house Friday and Saturday:

-TWW will be selling all kinds of original, one of a kind, handmade pieces. NO one else in the whole, wide world will have another one like it! As much as we love it, will not be selling any of the pieces from "This Thing Called Family" but we can tell you all about how and where to find them!

-We wanted YOU to have the first look at the new 2012 pieces for "This Thing Called Family" because we love you so much! We will have a small display set up for you to get a peek at these items that are not available yet to the public!

-NEW this year, with the acquisition of a Square device for our smart phones, we will be accepting credit cards! Checks and cash still work too! :-)

-As much as we LOVE your children, it's going to be very crowded - we are expecting our biggest turnout ever! They would have a ton more fun at home than at our ol' open house!

-We won't be available during the day tomorrow (Friday) because we have some visitors coming from Demdaco that we will be meeting with! Very excited to have them come!

- Don't forget to sign up for the open house giveaways by putting your name in the bowl at the giveaway table! Our friends have been very generous this year - go back through the last few posts to see what all you could win!

And now on to the last 3 open house giveaways!

Mamma Winger Connie is giving away this Love plaque with a handy hook. Hang your necklaces on it, or whatever you want!

Green Girl Laura is giving away this sunshiny owl - doesn't he just look like he has a sunshiny disposition?!

And me - Jill - I'm giving away this Welcome sign. Hang it on your front door or in your entryway for a colorful and cheerful way to greet visitors!

We hope you are as excited as we are and that you can sleep tonight. ;-) Let's all try to get a good nights sleep so we'll be ready for each other!

We can't wait to see you Friday and Saturday!

Friday Dec 2, 4pm-8pm
Saturday Dec 3, 10am-5pm

More details here!

Meet Andrea, Vanessa and Norma of itti biti!

2011-12-01T01:03:00.000-06:00

New to our open house this year!

itti biti - all things baby and more!

Andrea and Vanessa are friends who started itti biti when they began looking for unique baby products for their own babies, but couldn't find what they were looking for. Using their creative skills and Andrea's mom Norma's sewing skills, they put together an original collection of fun and funky baby essentials. The key to their success is handmade quality combined with stylish fabric choices which gives "itti biti" its original look.

itti bitti products include blankies, burp cloths, travel caddies, hats, aprons and more!

Andrea, Vanessa and Norma are generously giving away one of their caddies at our open house! A caddi is just the right size for diaper changing on the go. It holds travel wipes on one side and 2-3 diapers on the other. Throw it in your purse or diaper bag for the ultimate in style and convenience. Tuck one of their burp cloths in for a handy changing pad.

Thanks, itti biti gals, for joining us this year!

If you want more info about our Things With Wings Holiday Open House this Friday and Saturday in Iowa City, email us at paperprayers@hotmail.com and we'll send you an invite!

Be sure to look back at all of the other great artists who are joining us and stay tuned for the TWW giveaways, yet to be announced!

Meet Marnie!

2011-11-30T19:21:00.002-06:00

"My name is Marnie Saeugling. I have been a teacher for over 30 years. I am the mother of 3 grown children. I have always been a crafter and a few years ago I decided to start a business, Icing on the Cake Accessories. It started with flower headbands and it has grown into all kinds of accessories, mostly made from fabrics and recycled wool sweaters. I love all fabrics but my favorites are the batiks. I enjoy coming up with new ideas for products and trying them out. I always welcome custom orders, that way I know people are getting exactly what they want. For winter I am again featuring my ultra warm recycled wool mittens, lined with super soft minky. Stop by the open house and try them on."

Marnie is generously giving away this pair at our open house! Don't they look warm and cozy?!

You can reach Marnie at icingonthecakeaccessories@gmail.com or on her facebook page.

More giveaways to be announced yet!

Meet Diana and Marissa of Girls' Intuition!

2011-11-30T16:53:00.002-06:00

Diana and Marissa will be joining again this year at our open house!

It's all in the family! The girls behind Girls' Intuition also happen to be mother and daughter and awesome friends! How did they get started? They have always been crafty and jewelry has evolved into something that the two of them enjoy doing together. One day, Diana's husband commented that their jewelry looked just like what he was seeing in the catalogs (for a pretty price). They started thinking about how fun it would be to make unique, creative jewelry for those who want to express their style without spending a fortune. (like them!)

Why "Girls' Intuition?" The more excited they got about the prospect of this business venture, they started thinking that this could be a good opportunity for Marissa to play a part in helping earn money to put aside for her college tuition. Thus the name, Girls' InTUITION!

Here are some examples of their jewelry:

Diana and Marissa have generously offered to give away this necklace at our open house!

They will have a wide variety of necklaces, earrings, bracelets and sets for sale at our open house!

Meet Shadley!

2011-11-29T11:11:00.002-06:00

The next artist we'd like you to meet is Shadley Grimes, who will be joining us at our open house again this year with her original paintings. She's a great artist - and both Laura and I have special pieces of hers hanging in our own homes!

Shadley Grimes studied art at the University of Iowa where her work was called, "drawings with paint." Over the years her work has evolved into large "doodles" on upcycled windows. Painted with tempera, India ink, and other paint, these windows come ready to hang and sealed with a protective finish. Shadley loves creating interesting shapes and new color combinations. She lives in North Liberty with her husband Dan, daughters Eden and Elly, and son Esias.

Here's the painting I have in our bedroom:

*UPDATED!
We're really excited to show you pictures of a few of the new paintings that Shadley will have for sale this weekend:

We can't wait to spend the day with her - she's like an honorary sister and we always have a blast!

If you'd like to learn and see more of Shadley's past works, visit her website: http://shadleygrimes.com or contact her at grimesfam@gmail.com

If you're interested in learning more about our holiday open house this weekend in Iowa City, visit this facebook event and/or email us at paperprayers@hotmail.com for an invite!

Meet Penny of Penny Pops - New to Our Open House!

2011-11-28T10:02:00.002-06:00

This week we'll be introducing you to the artists and crafty people who will be joining for THIS weekend's open house in Iowa City! (Can you believe it's almost here?!)

Friday Dec 2, 4pm-8pm
Saturday Dec 3, 10am-5pm

The first person who we'd like you to meet is new this year to our open house! Her name is Penny Podhajsky and she will be selling her delicious cake pops:

Aren't they cute?!

Penny Podhajsky is the creator and baker of Penny Pops. Penny was awarded "Craft Master" in 2004 by the Recker-Noel Foundation. During the week Penny is the lunch lady at Weber School. Nobody sports a hairnet quite like Penny! Or you may have seen Penny zipping around on her red scooter delivering Penny Pops, or chauffeuring her four kids around Iowa City.

If you have never had a cake pop, you are in for a treat! Penny Pops are tasty, moist cake bites of various flavors, set on a lollipop stick and then hand crafted into various designs or characters like Santa hats, penguins, owls and snowmen. Make your next party extra special by serving Penny Pops!

If you're interested in learning more about what she does, you can contact Penny by emailing her at itspennypod@msn.com.

Welcome Penny! We're so glad you're joining us this year!

***********************************************

Stay tuned - we'll be bringing you more open house sneak peeks and introductions all week long. Later this week we'll be announcing some giveaways that you can enter when you come to the open house!

If you did not receive a postcard in the mail but want to get an invite, email us at paperprayers@hotmail.com. It's not too late!

Some Good News to Celebrate "Together"

2011-11-24T20:38:00.001-06:00

Here's something to be SUPER thankful for this Thanksgiving!!! We just received the most wonderful update from Emily, the "Be Brave" owner from this earlier post.

She had her lung and heart transplant on Sunday, Nov 6!!! Her expected 6 month wait turned into only 2 1/2 months! Yes, she's been in the hospital since our last post, waiting for 2 1/2 months -which seems plenty long to me!

She said that the pain of such a significant transplant was unbelievable. (I can't even imagine.) Although she was discharged this past Sunday night, she continues to recover at a Gift of Life transplant house - as she is required to stay in the area for the next 3 months.

She says it will just be her and her husband for Thanksgiving: "kind of a downer for the Holidays but this too shall pass.... I have a long ways to go, still using a wheelchair for any distance because I am so weak but I just have to do the work."

We are so amazed by God's goodness!!! We are praising God tonight and pray that Emily continue to be brave in her time of healing and resting and strengthening. We are so thankful that we have a God of healing and for our own health that we so easily take for granted. There is so much to be thankful for!

*****

So I thought of a great way for all of us to celebrate Thanksgiving "together!" Those of you who have been following her story, or are just now getting caught up, would you leave a note of encouragement for Emily here in our comments? She's come such a long ways, and still has so much work to do. I'm sure she'd love to hear from you guys! I'll make sure she sees them!

This year we are especially thankful for all of you!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Culver's Garden- Holiday Open House

2011-11-23T14:49:00.001-06:00

Last weekend we returned to Culver's Garden Center and Greenhouse in Marion, Iowa for their annual holiday open house! This was our second visit, so it was fun to see how much their store had changed with the addition of Christmas decorations and merchandise!

Special thanks to Claire, the new marketing expert at Culver's who even sent out press releases! How crazy is that?!

TTCF plays well with others! Here, TTCF and Natural Life are displayed together very nicely.

We had a fun time visiting with some very special customers, one of whom told us some great stories of how God is at work in her life and how she plans on using various pieces from our collection to remind her and others of this! Big Praise!

It was quite a kick to see this beautiful tree, decorated and dedicated to our winged plaques!

Thanks again, Culver's, for selling "This Thing Called Family" and for a great afternoon!

They sent us home with these giant mums, pie pumpkins, and a great idea for a Thanksgiving centerpiece. We'll be sure to show you how they turned out!

We wish you all a very happy Thanksgiving, and hope you can spend some time reflecting on all God has done over the last year.

We are super grateful this year for all of YOU!

Should We Be Concerned?

2011-11-15T08:00:00.000-06:00

We're starting to notice a new theme emerging in Mamma Winger's work. What do you think it all means?!

See for yourself:

Beaverdale Holiday Boutique 2011

2011-11-14T07:37:00.002-06:00

Another Beaverdale year has come and gone - and once again it was a blast! We've come to know so many familiar faces at Holy Trinity school in Des Moines - and we still can't get over the hospitality of this community! Everyone is super helpful and it's so much fun to see the teamwork of entire families working together to do their parts to make the event run smoothly. It is no small task to pull this show off- they empty all of their classrooms, help vendors load and unload, put together a raffle, humongous bake sale that takes over their school library, coat and bag checkers, and delicious homemade lunch options. You can see why this is one of our favorite events of the year!

We set up Friday afternoon, to be open for a couple of hours Friday night. People were lined up at the door and around the side of the building, waiting to get in! We were in our usual spot: a kindergarten classroom that was transformed into "North Pole room 1" :-) Here's some pics of our spot:

We love this spot, because we can use the back of this giant bookcase as extra hanging space!

here are some new favs of Green Girl's:

And here are a few new ones of Mamma Winger's:

Here's sort of an overview of the room we were in. These shoppers were looking at the pieces we had hanging on the back of the bookshelf I mentioned earlier. Some of you may know our friend Heather Pentico? Well that gal in the red jacket and hat is her college roommate! We actually met her for the first time at last year's show and she looked and looked at buying a family rules piece, but did not buy one. She said she'd immediately regretted it, and has been waiting all year to come back and get one this year!!! We're glad to say she walked away this year a happy customer!

Since most of these pieces sold, we're going to be hard at work for the next couple of weeks, getting ready for our own show: the annual Things With Wings Holiday Open House, Dec 2 + 3! New this year, we've added Friday evening hours! All the details - hours, special features, the RSVP and how you can receive your own invitation are here on this facebook event page. We'll be adding more details about each of the artist friends who are joining us for the weekend, along with a sneak peek at the item that they are giving away in our drawings! There's going to be a prize from each of us! PLUS, those of you who attend will get the first look at new Demdaco items that are not available to the public yet! These pieces will be joining our "This Thing Called Family" collection in January, but we wanted YOU to be the first ones to see them up close in person! So this year promises to be even bigger and better than last year! Can't wait! Gather some girlfriends and start planning a road trip to come visit us!

TWO Open Houses Tomorrow!

2011-11-04T19:22:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow we have the joy of spending our day at two fine retailers who are selling "This Thing Called Family!" They've invited us to be a part of their Holiday Open Houses - a sort of "meet the artists" type of thing - and so we're going to be hanging around and visiting with folks!

From 10am-1pm we'll be at The Treasure House in Ankeny, Iowa for their Christmas Open House!

Then, we'll travel to Melcher-Dallas to City Floral for another Holiday Open House!!! We'll be there from 2pm-5pm!

We'd love to visit, so if you're in the area, come out and say hello!!!

TWO Winners!

2011-11-01T22:42:00.001-05:00

*UPDATED 11-2-11!

We have two winners to announce from our flower accessory giveaway! They get to choose what kind they like from this post, and I'll make them one of their very own!

The two winners are Kathy of Why Ducks and Aimee of Artsyville!

Congrats girls!

*11-2-11
Because Aimee is in the midst of a big move and so much is up in the air, she ask that we choose a new winner to insure the prize arrives safe and sound!

The new winner is Lori Leissner of Leissner Art!

congrats Lori!

email me at paperprayers@hotmail.com with your preference and your mailing address!

Accessories from Vintage Ties (No Sew!)

2011-10-28T12:00:00.015-05:00

The other day I was browsing through Goodwill on a hunt for a red and yellow striped tie for my son's Harry Potter Halloween costume. I did not find one, but I did find a red one that I ended up painting yellow stripes on! While digging around, several other vintage-y men's ties caught my eye because of their patterns, textures and colors. I didn't know exactly what I was going to do with them, but knew that I wanted to try my hand at making some flowers for hair accessories. At $1.37 a tie, it wasn't a huge investment to bring these home:

Gathered some more supplies at a trip to Wal-Mart: cheap headbands from the hair product section and alligator-type hair clips from the craft and bead department:

I started by ripping out the seam up the back of the tie. Pretty easy work as many of the ties were a bit worn out!

Once it was opened up, the inside lining removed and laid out flat, I realized I could easily divide the tie into 4 long strips of fabric, by cutting down the length on the creases and then cutting up the middle:

Cool! I could get 4 flowers - at least - out of one tie!

Starting at the narrower end of one strip, I tied a knot:

And started wrapping the fabric around the knot, twisting the fabric and hot gluing as I went, until I ended up with the size flower I wanted:

Most of the flowers I made required less than one strip of fabric! After making several flowers, it was time to move on to a headband. The key to wrapping the headband was to start with two small strips of fabric cut as narrow as the headband to fold over and glue to the tips of each end. Then it was just a matter of wrapping around, gluing as I went:

I tried my headband on in the mirror, to see exactly where I wanted to glue my flowers, then glued them on, off-centered:

ta-da!

I also made some single flower hair clips. For me, the alligator type clip was crucial, because I also wanted to be able to use the flowers to accessorize my scarves:

Gluing the clip on required me to work quickly: I laid down some glue, adhered the clip, but kept it open so that the other side didn't get caught in the glue, then laid down a scrap of fabric to cover the glued side of the clip. It made a very strong bond!

ta-da!

I love that this same type of clip works with my scarves too!

I spied this plain leather cuff at Goodwill, and added a flower to it too!

After some more flower making, I ended up with one strip from each tie leftover. This gave me the idea to combine them into a braid. I googled how to braid with 4 strands and after some experimenting, figured out how to incorporate the braiding around a headband. I know this picture is not great, but it gives you an idea of how I staggered the strips when I glued them on. I also made sure to have two strips on one side and two on the other to start my braiding.

For this braided headband, I wanted a different kind of flower that incorporated all of the different fabrics that I'd used in the braid. I gathered some scraps from the wider ends of the ties and hot glued little gathers:

until I had a rough circle:

Added a slightly smaller one from another fabric:

And then added an even smaller flower of the "knot, wrap and twist" variety from above:

Trimmed it up a bit, then glued to my braided headband:

Ta-da!

Lastly, I decided to try my hand at some 'feathers.'

They were too flimsy as is, so I hot glued a smaller piece of the tie lining to the backs of the feathers to make them stiffer:

Here's what I ended up with:

Now I have a nice new collection of hair accessories!

Geesh! Now don't get carried away! Maybe just one at a time:

I'm contemplating making more to sell, but it was a lot of farting around! I'm hoping that now that I'm done with the thinking and experimenting phase, the next batch would go quicker!

Do you think people would buy them? I've been wearing mine around town this week and have gotten several compliments!

*linking this project to Flamingo Toes, Be Different...Act Normal, Whipperberry and Tater Tots and Jello.

Inspiration

2011-10-24T08:00:00.001-05:00

Here are some things that have been inspiring me lately:

Hedgeballs in our yard. We gathered them into a bright green bucket. There's just something about those competing greens...

Centerpiece on our kitchen island. Black and white really do look really great with any other color! Especially teal green:

One of our very favorite places to get patterned paper is in the process of going out of business. :-(
(They're still looking for a buyer, if you know of anybody that's interested in owning a scrapbooking store!) We've been watching from week to week as their supplies dwindle and the deals get better. Last week everything in the store went from 50 to 60% off, and so despite the fact that I really don't need more, I found myself spending almost $40 in paper. I'll let you do the math.

A trip to Goodwill on a search for a red and yellow striped tie for my oldest's halloween costume resulted in all of these other oldies but goodies coming home with me. At the time I wasn't sure what I was going to do with them, I was just inspired by the patterns and colors! And at $1.37 a piece, it wasn't a huge risk. But now I've got some ideas in the works:

I'll show you the results of my experiments later on this week!

What have you been inspired by lately?

Fall Colors

2011-10-18T10:07:00.000-05:00

Fall doesn't last nearly long enough. Maybe that's what makes it so special.

The beautiful fall colors:

October 6

Do you find the fall color palette inspiring your artwork, like I do?

The leaves are almost gone already. Which always makes me sad:

October 18

Have you turned your heat on yet where you live? Our highs this week are in the 50s and 60s, which means it gets pretty chilly at night! Stay warm!

Everything is alright in the end....

2011-10-14T14:32:00.001-05:00

If it's not alright, it's not the end.

This is the message that someone out there needs to hear today. Share it with someone who needs a little hope.

Mini Art Blocks

2011-10-11T17:40:00.001-05:00

I scanned a few of my favorite new pieces and reduced them in size to make these little art blocks. I added a unique painted border to each one and voila! They're about 3 1/2x 4 inches. These minis were a big hit at our last art show and are now almost gone! So I'll have to make more for our upcoming show in Des Moines!

Thinking that some of these are going to end up on some pendants as well!

It's a Beautiful Day!

2011-10-04T10:40:00.000-05:00

Right across the way from Green Girl's Welcome Wall is this chalkboard. (She added the scallops to a plain chalkboard. Because everything looks better with scallops.) There's always a great message on her board to meet you where you are. Literally. This is in her entryway. Such a warm vibe, the minute you step foot into her house!

Now don't let today slip away from you!

New Creative Works by Mamma Winger

2011-09-24T12:29:00.001-05:00

Here are some pictures I took of Mamma Winger's newest works at one of our recent art festivals. Enjoy!

I think this first one is my favorite!

Her work just makes a person smile!

Pay no attention to the goofball in the mirror.

boxes for things and stuff:

another fav:

here's something new (for us): elephants!

bird made from scrap pieces of trim:

Love this sunburst:

We're Blown Away.

2011-09-22T07:36:00.002-05:00

We are! We're blown away by God's goodness. We're blown away that we get to do this job. We're blown away that God would choose to give us - ordinary, messed up us - even a glimpse of what He's doing. We're blown away by the bravery, the beautiful vitality, the sweet blessings and the giving spirits of all of you. We don't even know what all you're going through. Sometimes you tell us why a message speaks to you. You've got your story and we've got ours. You see, the very fact that a piece of art came to be is because we need to hear that message where we are in our own lives. We also create as an act of worship to our most Creative God. We create for others whether we ever get to realize it or not. This really kind of miraculous thing happens: the art speaks to someone else too, right where they are. Our situations may be totally different on the surface, but going deeper, our hearts are both needing the same reminders. That's something so precious and humbling to be a witness to. That you would share even a tiny spark of what makes you "you" with us by sharing your story, and that the thing that we have in common is the art? Well we feel tremendously honored and humbled and connected to you in a way that's hard to describe. Suddenly strangers aren't strangers anymore.

The first story we'd like to share with you is about a woman who found 3 flowers of similar size to hang together as a tryptich. Here are 2 of them (we don't have a picture of the 3rd):

The reason? There is a brand new mental health clinic that just opened in the Waterloo/Cedar Falls area. The walls have just been painted; they are blank slates - no artwork - until now! Three of our pieces are now hanging in this new facility, and who knows how or when someone may be encouraged! What an honor - it blows us away!

The next story is about the woman who bought this piece:

She quietly purchased this "Be Brave" piece while moving one arm gingerly due to the PICC line in her forearm. She probably never would have said more, except that she was with her friend who leaned over to tell us why she was buying it. The following Monday - 2 days from then (now over a week ago!) she was having a heart transplant. Yes. A heart transplant. The brave woman joked around about how she needed something encouraging to look at in her 'suite' because she was going to be staring at the same hospital walls for quite awhile. God has brought this nameless woman to mind many times this past week: wondering where she is, how she's doing, hoping she's being loved and cared for well by those around her. We are praying for God's healing hand to be upon her and that she'd be comforted through God's people and His peace.

***UPDATE!!! Emily, the woman mentioned above, e-mailed us with an update when she saw this blogpost! In my ignorance, I just thought you go in, you have your transplant. duh. I don't think sometimes! Emily explained that she's met all of the criteria to get moved up to the top level of the waiting list for her heart and lungs transplants. And now she is waiting. She is not allowed to leave the unit because of the monitoring. There are 4 patients in her unit awaiting transplants. One has been waiting 7.5 MONTHS for a liver and heart. Another's been waiting a month. So they all wait, trying to avoid getting sick or anything that would set them back. She says,

"so that is what I am doing. Waiting...I so appreciate the kinds things you wrote, that was just so neat. I have been told through out my life I have been an inspiration and touched other people's lives but until I read your post I hadn’t quite felt/believed it. If there is anything I can ask for besides prayers is that we help people understand the need for organ donation, that in the event of a death, what a miraculous way to honor the deceased life by giving new life to another. Up to 7 people actually."

Sometimes it's the waiting that takes the most courage. Thank you so much for the update, Emily. Our prayers are definitely with you as you be brave in your waiting.

Then there's the story of this woman named Sarah who bought a different "Be Brave" this past weekend. Here she is:

She heard that we were gathering stories to share and so sent us this email to share with all of you. Read on in her own words:

My husband and I purchased a few of your pieces a couple years ago when we
were decorating our daughter's nursery.  They're my favorites out of the
artwork in her room.  One of them has a line from my favorite Wordsworth
poem - they're so special.
 
My husband died a few months ago - a very young 36 years old - after a long
struggle with a traumatic brain injury.  We spent 6-7 months in and out of
numerous hospitals and rehabilitation hospitals - and finally spent our last
week together back in the Quad Cities at a hospice facility.  This idea of
"home" expanded in our lives.  We made home wherever we were.  A few weeks
ago I realized that I had mentioned this concept of home to my husband in
our wedding vows - and had the latin word for home, "domus", tattooed on the
inside of my wrist as a reminder.  So I was bowled over when I saw a piece
of yours that mentioned home being wherever we are (I'm paraphrasing and
butchering it, I apologize).  While I couldn't bring myself to buy that one,

(we're guessing that this is the piece that Sarah saw.)

I did find another one that I love, "Be Brave".  I started a
blog http://www.mrsbsbrain.com/1/post/2011/09/a-fall-approaching.html in
the aftermath of my husband's death and have a picture of me holding
it.

So just in the two nights since buying it, my 2 1/2 year old daughter is
talking to me about being brave and what that means.
 
Thank you so much for the pieces you create - they're lovely and touching
beyond what you can imagine.

Our situations may be different than Sarah's on the surface, but going deeper, our hearts are all needing the same reminders to be brave. It's precious and humbling to be a witness to the way art is connecting us. It's hard to describe, but blows us away. We are praying that Sarah would have much peace and bravery as she and her sweet baby girl begin to find their new normal.

The last sweet story we have to share with you is about a cute little elderly woman (probably in her 70s) who bought a piece with this message on it:

She and her husband are NEWLYWEDS! Yes, really! Been married 7 months! Again: blown away! They purchased this piece for their home. Who knows what kind of journey they've been on all these years and what events led them to finally finding each other. Our guess is that it was anything BUT boring!!! How sweet that they now have each other! This message is perfect for them, and we wish them much joy and happiness together!!!!

We don't know why, but lately it seems like more stories than usual are coming our way: people are going through all kinds of hard, crazy and fabulous things. It just feels like we're supposed to share them with you - so you can be blown away too by how God is working! Many of you reading this are going through some major stuff too. Do you know that you are not alone?! Sometimes we get a glimpse into your stories, often we don't. Either way, we are going to keep on this path that God's got us on, while giving Him the glory.

New Way to Purchase our Work

2011-09-20T19:18:00.000-05:00

We're trying something new. Lots of you ask if you can see the items we've got available for sale right now. We've got a TON of items, but don't have the time or patience to get it all up on etsy! So we thought we'd try to gather some items all in one spot for you to look at. We have a new section up there on our blog menu bar, called "TWW For Purchase!" We'll be updating it periodically with one of a kind items that we currently have available for you to purchase! We'll give a shout via facebook when new items are added. Go check it out!

Join Us for Riverssance 2011!

2011-09-16T13:14:00.001-05:00

We'll be at Riverssance in Davenport this weekend!

24th Annual Riverssance Festival of Fine Art
Date: September 17 & 18
Where: Lindsay Park, Village of East Davenport, IA
Time: Saturday 10 am – 5 pm & Sunday 10 am – 4 pm
Admission: $4

This beautiful outdoor festival takes place on a scenic bluff overlooking the Mississippi River! Over 100 artists from around the Midwest, live music and entertainment, wine tastings, a free children's art tent with make-and-take projects and a delicious variety of food vendors make this festival a great family event!

Our booth is #7 we've got a great spot! - come say hi!

ARTapalooza 2011

2011-09-14T09:44:00.000-05:00

ARTapalooza in Cedar Falls this past weekend was a blast! We loved the atmosphere, the weather and all of the great people that we got to visit with!

Here are some highlights of our booth:

This show was our first experience using our new Square device to process credit cards. Although we were a bit nervous about the whole thing, it worked really well, was very easy and fast to use and it's going to be a great benefit to our totals!

Last year we were thrilled to win the Merchant's Award - which was our first time at this show. This year look at what we won: "Best of Show!" A group of about 10 members from the ARTapalooza committee came to our booth, made a little speech, took our picture, and presented us with a ribbon and check! Then they all clapped! It was quite the little moment! So we hung our ribbon next to this cool name sign that they made for all the artists to hang in their booths.

A reporter from the Waterloo/Cedar Falls Courier interviewed us for this article about the event.

This is a show that really takes good care of all of their artists. They provided us with a sack breakfast, sack lunch, bottles of water and a trail mix snack. We've got to keep up our strength you know! We truly appreciated the thoughtfulness and care.

But even more amazing were all of the stories that we had the privilege to hear from customers about why they were buying a particular piece. Humbling and exciting to be a small part of what God is doing in others' lives! Those special stories will be coming up next, plus a look at some of Mamma Winger's newest pieces.

In the meantime, we're getting ready for Riverssance, this weekend in Davenport!

Custom Orders

2011-09-02T09:51:00.002-05:00

This first custom piece was for a late wedding gift and of course I had to be sure to include their yellow lab!

This second one was a family rules that the family wrote up themselves. It's the biggest piece I've ever mailed! Some of you may remember that I posted a sneak peek on facebook of the Hug square, and another of this baby all wrapped up, ready to ship, but never did show you the whole thing. I'm such a tease...

Well here it is!!! It was a doozy! 2ft x 4ft!

This last one is very special (but they're ALL really special- because they're made WITH love and to SHOW love! :-) But this one is special because it is for a young military couple:

They've only been married a few months, got married quickly and were then relocated. They are just starting out their lives together and have already made a lot of sacrifices for one another. The wife wanted to give her husband something that conveyed how much she appreciates him and also demonstrates how close the Marines are to their hearts and lives. It was important that the piece included the Marine icon of the eagle, globe and anchor. A bit out of my comfort zone, which is always good! I think I pulled it off....

The Marine Corps' motto is "Semper Fidelis" which means Always Faithful. LOVE that. Very powerful statement for such few words. It encompasses both their military and marital relationship, don't you think?!

Here was the Marine wife's response upon seeing pictures I emailed her to let her know her artwork was done:

"OH MY GOSH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I almost cried when I saw it!! It's absolutely perfect. Thank you so much for the thought and effort you put in to making this for us. It truly depicts exactly what I was looking for; that the Marine Corps is as close to my heart as he is. :)

You did PHENOMENAL!! I can't wait to see it in person."

Aww, sweet words! Thanks Ashley! Can you see why we love this job?! This was such a pleasure to do, as we have the utmost respect and pride for those serving our country!

Go Hawks!

2011-08-30T09:13:00.001-05:00

Here's something I've never done before: a family tree in Hawkeye colors: Black and Gold!

My piece is toned down a bit from the bright gold usually associated with the emblem, but still!

Sorry, you won't find any hidden tigerhawks.

This piece was commissioned by the children to give to their parents on their 40th wedding anniversary!

Trippin' down Memory Lane!

2011-08-28T15:53:00.006-05:00

Aah, yes! Good old memory lane. Mama Winger here and sometimes my memory lane comes to a dead end! if you know what I mean! But I did think of a couple things I use to make to add to Jill's list. You did REALLY good, by the way, Jill! I also made art using nails pounded into a board and a thin wire wrapped around from nail to nail to form a picture. And I might have done a macrame project or two. No wonder I'm so tired these days! But what I decided to tell you about today is that people use to call me "The Angel Lady" not because I was so holy or beautiful or anything, but because I painted nothing but angels for a number of years. These were done on wood, metal, matboard, paper, you name it, whatever I could get my hands on. I even used one of those old wooden pineapple shaped dishes upside down to make an angel out of it. Sorry no photo . . . just as well - trust me on that one! I have a few angel photos to show you from my past. They won't be great, cause my photo-taking skills are lacking, but you can get the idea anyway. Whoops! I guess the first one is above us. See, this is why I don't post on here very often - I obviously don't know what I'm doing and my other Wingers get frustrated with me. Can you blame them? Anyhow, the fairy one with striped tights is probably at least 16 or 17 years old. Going to add another one now. Yeah, ok, the purple one with the pointy hat is equally as old and she hangs in my purple kitchen! Thanks for hanging in there with me, but I am going to quit here while the quitting's good. My phone will be ringing soon and I can just hear it now, "Mother!........."

Will You Take a Trip Down Memory Lane With Us?

2011-08-26T15:56:00.000-05:00

The other day, Just Something I Made was asking her facebook readers what crafts they liked to do when they were kids. It got me thinking and remembering some of our favorites.

(My sisters are going to be totally impressed with me because I'm sort of known as the sister who blocked out our entire childhood. Not because anything traumatic happened, but just because I have a horrible memory!)

Will you take a trip down memory lane with me?

We were totally obsessed with our Fashion Plates. You could mix and match tops and bottoms, then create a rubbing off of the raised plates. The reverse side had different textures so that you could make your fabrics have different patterns to them! This picture shows the exact set we had. MAN, do I wish we'd hung on to these! Why don't they make anything like this anymore? When googling for these images, I discovered that there was a New Kids On the Block version of fashion plates! Why did I never know this?!

We had a set of Childcraft Encyclopedias exactly like these. Can you guess which book was our favorite?

Yep, it was the one entitled "Make and Do." We did tie dye projects with food coloring and paper towels from this book. I think we also attempted some sock puppets. Anybody remember what else was in the Make and Do book?

Another big hit in our house were latch hook rugs. Mamma Winger made a big wall hanging in rusts and browns that she designed herself and so we thought we'd like to do it too. I don't remember what we ended up making but when I googled it a lot of Care Bears, rainbows and unicorns showed up, so I wouldn't be surprised if it was something like that!

Then of course there there was the potholder phase. Everybody had one of those stages, right?!

Man, it was frustrating to get those stretchy loops pulled long enough to hook on the loom, especially near the end, but the results were oh so worth it! I mean isn't that what every relative wanted from us?

Mamma Winger has been crafting for a loooong time. She's gone through some phases of her own. When country crafts were really popular, there was a tin punching phase. I SO wanted to do it too! She'd buy big rolls of tin flashing (super sharp!) and use her tin snips to cut out shapes for ornaments. Then she'd use an awl and hammer to punch out a design. One year she came to my elementary school and taught a group of us how to do this craft with tinfoil pie plates.

We also spent lots of time making paper snowflakes and fortune tellers, playing paper dolls, and coloring in our barbie coloring books. We would also ask to help our mom with her artwork so she'd give us backgrounds or other areas that didn't require a lot of detail to paint.

One thing we wish we'd learned how to do when we were growing up was sew. Mamma Winger is a GREAT sewer - she even went to school for fashion design! There's some difference of opinion on why exactly we never learned to sew. Something about trying to teach us, and us not being interested, or it not going very well due to the frustration factor.... I can't imagine ME being difficult! :-) All I know, is now I really wish I knew more than I do!

Mom made us lots of barbie doll clothes including a tuxedo for Ken!

....or I mean Michael Jackson! Pay no attention to the fact that he's pantless. A few years back we got out the ol' box of barbie stuff (THAT stuff we did hang on to!) thinking it was time to pass the torch to the only girl child of the family - Laura's daughter. Here's a funny post I wrote about it at the time.

Green Girl and I often wore matching outfits in different colors that Mom had made us, which prompted people to ask if we were twins although there is 15 months between us. She also made all of our prom dresses and my bridesmaid's dresses! Now I'm going to show you something that will really take your breath away, or mine at least. Are you ready for this? I can't believe I'm doing this...

Let me start by prefacing this picture with these facts: One, it was 1997. Two, we all thought we looked good in short hair. Some of us were right, some of us were wrong. Three, our dad passed away completely unexpectedly 2 1/2 months before this, leaving us devastated, pale and walking around like zombies.

L to R: Sis-in-law Shelly, Youngest sis Emily, Me the Blushing, ok extremely pale Bride(Jill), and sister (aka Green Girl) Laura

We celebrated our 14 year wedding anniversary earlier this week and my husband's aunt wrote me that our wedding had been beautiful and it was the first time she'd ever heard of the color "eggplant!" So see, even back then we were 'somethin' else!' (You can interpret that phrase however you want!) That purple fabric was shinier on one side than the other, so we used both sides to make the "vests" and skirts.

Anyway, this post sure has gone in a different direction than I thought it was going to!

Looking back, I'd have to say we had pretty crafty childhoods. It definitely has led us to where we are today.

I would love if the other Thing With Wingers would add their own input, memories, or corrections to my faulty memories at the bottom of this post. If each of my family members writes in a different color and signs their name, then it'll be easier for you readers to come back to this post later and see what's been added!

How about you, readers? What was your favorite thing to make, create, or craft as you were growing up? Share your memories in the comments!

*And come back later on this weekend or next week to see what my other family members have added to the discussion below!

Need Inspiration? Try Laying It All Out There!

2011-08-17T16:22:00.005-05:00

When you're looking inside a fresh new bottle, can or tube of paint, sometimes it's hard to predict what that color will look like once it's dry. The dry color is often quite a bit darker. Sometimes our custom projects require us to work within a specific color scheme. Hey, Green Girl - believe it or not, not EVERYBODY is as in love with green as we all are! Gasp!

Green Girl made us this color chart to help us collaborate on a project.

If you use a wide variety of colors in your work or if you are ever in need of inspiration, try making yourself a color chart. You could make a chart of just your favs. (Sometimes you can picture the "just right" green, but the name escapes you!) Or make a chart of new colors you are unsure of + want to get to know better. (You might be surprised to discover a new favorite!) Try making a chart that experiments with different color combinations. (It's always a great source of inspiration.) Or make one for muted colors + one for bolds. In our opinion, there is no right or wrong way to make a color chart. You just want it to be useful for you, so organize your colors however you want!

Having some of your paint colors charted and labeled by color name + maybe even by brand too (if you use a variety) may sound anal retentive and we certainly do not refer to it every day, but it's kind of a fun exercise + handy to pull out later for reference once in awhile. And if your very fondest, favoritest color gets discontinued + you are desperately searching for just the right replacement, you could make a color chart of just all greens....(ahem).....or reds, or whatever.

"Laying it all out there" gives you a new perspective sometimes. And you might find that the chart itself ends up being its own kind of masterpiece!

Linking up to WhipperBerry and Tatertots + Jello!

My New Wall.

2011-08-15T10:59:00.004-05:00

This is my new wall. First of all, I need to explain how extremely difficult it was to take a picture of this! It was a serious struggle and I hate struggles!!! Then, Jill and Mom came over and I made them struggle, too. And then there was some creative positioning of body parts in order to get a proper angle to shoot this. And there may or may not have been a video shot in there somewhere, too, of a certain someone army crawling down my hallway with a camera. I ended up climbing about halfway up my staircase, grabbing the railing, and doing a death defying lean out of the doorway.

I've been making signs with this sentiment on it for a very long time and people seem to identify with it! DEMDACO has produced a wonderful piece with this exact wording if you're interested! For this display, I basically went down in my basement and scrounged around until I found this collection of things. I like how it's funky and dimensional and "one of a kind"! It tells the world that I embrace the loud craziness that we call family. Some days it is easier than others! As the kids get read to start another school year, I realize someday my house will be quiet, so I'm going to love it while I can!

Easy Peasy

2011-08-09T17:41:00.002-05:00

Faith makes things possible....not easy.

11x37 inches

but, but, but "easy" is so much....easier! Doesn't it just figure that it's usually in the difficult things that we do the most growing.

My kids say this nonsense phrase, which no one wants to take credit for: "Easy, peasy, arctic cheezy."

I have no idea what it means and neither do they.

Random, right?

How about you? Got anything random to share? Go for it!

Dysfunctional Family Tree.

2011-08-08T14:26:00.001-05:00

Well, the summer is coming to a close. I have pretty much spent my summer artless. I should maybe say not completely free of art, but certainly not doing anything to get ready for the two back to back shows we have coming up in September. I've had enough custom orders this summer to stay relatively busy and some deadlines to complete for some things coming out next year. I did get to make a few things for my own house, which doesn't happen very often. I did a mini makeover in my living room, and made up a new family tree for our wall. I tell you this because this has also been the latest "drama" in our family as well. My darling Lily has asked me no less than 10 times a day, "Mommy. Why isn't Cookie's name on our family tree? Don't you love Cookie anymore? Isn't Cookie part of our Family? Why don't you like Cookie anymore?" I just want to set this straight. Cookie is our dog. Yes. I like her. Love her? Depends on the day you ask me. Will I ever put her name on a permanent piece of art in our home? No. Am I an animal hater? No. Do I consider Cookie my daugher? No. Since I know you all are so curious, here is the vicious beast I speak of.............

Love Birds on Cloud 9

2011-08-05T15:19:00.004-05:00

This first one was painted on old dictionary pages that peek through the paint.


10x24, $65

This second one was painted on top of paper with a pattern of very colorful circles.

10x24, $65, SOLD!

Both of these are for sale and are one of a kind originals. If you're interested, email me at paperprayers@hotmail.com and I'll give you more info! These would make good wedding/anniversary gifts!

Love Me...

2011-08-04T17:24:00.000-05:00

Came across an image today of this piece that I created awhile back and it hit me in a whole new way.

Love me when I least deserve it, because that is when I need it the most.

Creativity Takes Courage + Pinterest

2011-07-28T12:28:00.002-05:00

-Quote from Henri Matisse. Art by Green Girl.

We love, love, love this quote! It's kind of a motto to live by. Of course, some days we are more courageous than others. That's just life.

We are busily working away on designs for Demdaco for next year (can't WAIT to show you what's up ahead for January and summer 2012! It's gonna be on a whole. 'notha. level!) Custom orders and all the kids home for summer vacay are also keeping us very busy!

Have you hopped on the Pinterest bandwagon yet? Yeah, I know, I know, like we all NEED one more social media obsession.... :-) We're slowly getting our feet wet, and if you're already a fan of it, we'd love to connect with you! You can follow us at http://pinterest.com/thingswithwings *If you love the creativity quote above as much as we do, maybe you'll want to pin it! And/or, if you have a favorite item from "This Thing Called Family," we'd love if you'd stick a pin in it too! (Do people say that?)

Work in Progress

2011-07-18T06:00:00.001-05:00

wonder what these are for?

wings for some....things

fun letters


stripes that stretch on....

....and on....

If Your Name Is Sydney, Raise Your Hand....

2011-07-16T11:54:00.000-05:00

I just finished up two separate special orders for two separate Sydney's......I don't think that's ever happened before.

Sparkler Dancing

2011-07-04T06:00:00.026-05:00

Happy 4th of July everybody! Nothing expresses our patriotism quite like this video that we made a few years ago.

See these girls, watch that scene, diggin' the dancing queens:

Bet you've never seen anything quite like that before!

Yes, I'm the one who doesn't like sparklers all that much. I admit it. But I think you'll all agree that my fellow Thing With Wingers more than make up for my lack of enthusiasm! I am a fun person....really!

We hope your day is full of family time, good food, fireworks and fun! Go ahead: do a little dance when you light your sparklers!!! And if you're not up for sparkler dancing, we at least hope you're having the time of your life!

Art and All the Trimmings.

2011-06-27T15:15:00.007-05:00

We recently acquired some wood scraps that are regularly discarded from a local millwork: trims, crown moldings, baseboards, and casings in a variety of sizes and lengths. We already showed you what Mamma Winger did with her pieces in this post (the last 6 pieces). She built hod-podge "frames" around the edges of her pieces, adding fabric here, paper and words there. Doodles and paint too. But here are a few more you haven't seen yet:

I decided to use my scraps to build "platforms" for birds to perch on. I had so much fun experimenting with these and love all of the dimension! The stuffed birds came about by experimenting with kraft paper and matboard. Kind of a very simple form of paper mache. It was fun to add doodles to the different levels of trims:

We LOVE being able to use someone else's scraps! These were super inexpensive to make: trim pieces were free and I made the stuffed birds from supplies I already had! One man's trash is a Things With Wings treasure!

Now we just need to get Green Girl to use her scrap pieces, and show us all what she did. I'm just sure it will be fabulous. Will you get on her case about that?

I am trying something new this week and participating in some linky parties from some of our favorite blogs! Sharing this project on Be Different, Act Normal, Tatertots and Jello, WhipperBerry, Finding Fabulous, Simply Designing, Momma's Kinda Crafty and The Shabby Nest.

Scallop Bliss

2011-06-25T14:56:00.001-05:00

Can you tell that scallops make us happy?

What makes you happy in your artwork? Share with us!

We Believe We Have a Winner for the Believe Pillow!

2011-06-22T23:44:00.000-05:00

We have a winner for our believe pillow!

The random number generator picked #15:

Adrianne Kohl!

Here's what she said about where she's seen This Thing Called Family,

"A Whimsical Place in Woodbury, MN is the closest to me... only minutes away! I just love this pillow, and would be so cute in my daughter's bedroom on her rocking chair! Pick me! PS I love all your new owl things!"

Congrats Adrianne! We hope your daughter likes it!

We're so sorry that so many of you have had trouble commenting on our blog for this week's giveaway. We are not the only ones who have said blogger has been acting funny. So we added all of the facebook comments to this drawing.

Fun Times at Demdaco Got Us in the Mood for a Giveaway!

2011-06-20T08:00:00.025-05:00

*The giveaway below is now closed!

Last week we finally made our first trip to the Demdaco headquarters in Leawood, Kansas - a suburb of Kansas City. We've been working together for a year and a half now on "This Thing Called Family," so it was WAY time to actually meet some of the people that we felt we already sorta knew from our many phone and email conversations!

We stayed in this very fun hotel Thursday night just down the road called Aloft. Here's a picture of our room:

Friday we spent at Demdaco. Their headquarters are beautiful! Everyone we met was so friendly and it was so great to get a peek behind the scenes + get the opportunity to thank everyone for all their hard work. This is a company that truly cares about their employees, the products that they create and the spirits of their customers.

photo courtesy of Demdaco

We toured the showroom and the rest of the building, then had lunch with the VP of product development as well as the product designers in charge of our line. It was so easy - we laughed and visited like the fast friends that we already are. It didn't seem like the first time we'd actually met. We seriously don't know the last time we laughed that much in one day! At one point, we were told, "You guys are exactly like I thought you'd be!" Which could have gone either way, but we took as a compliment!

After lunch we finished our tour (which was all part of the master plan to build the anticipation and drive us nuts with waiting) we finally got to see the samples of all the new pieces coming out next year! And man, oh man, are you all gonna LOVE it! Oh, how we wish we could share the details! But it's all very hush-hush right now until January.

Then it was on to a brainstorming session for future projects. It was a fun time of getting our heads together and watching what happens! (Did you know that it's almost possible to see idea bubbles taking shape above a particular person's head?! :-)) It feels like our eyes and hearts are being opened to all of these new possibilities and directions. It kind of left us dizzy by the end of the day! But again, not much we can share at this time except to say that some amazing things are happening and some REALLY exciting developments are taking shape!

Basically, it rocked. The whole gosh darn thing.

Demdaco is a company full of real people. They are genuine. They play hard and have so much fun together, but they work even harder. We consider it a true honor to work along with them!

Demdaco, thanks for the warm welcome! Y'all are invited to Iowa City any time - just say the word!

Here's just one example of what we mean when we say "warm welcome" (keep your eye on the first line of "news" scrolling across):

Since our Demdaco trip has gotten us in such a good mood, it feels like time for a giveaway!

So let's give away our Believe pillow! It measures 18x7. It's one of several pillows in "This Thing Called Family." Have you seen all the others?

To enter:
Tell us the name of a store in your area that sells "This Thing Called Family" and the town it's in.

Haven't found one yet? Go to the store locator and find one! Then come back and share it with us!

That's all you gotta do!

(one entry per person please! and please leave us a way to get ahold of you!)

*Your comment won't be visible until we've approved it, extra comments will be deleted.

We'll announce a winner here Wednesday night! Good Luck!

Recent Special Orders

2011-06-12T12:33:00.000-05:00

Here are a few special orders I've done recently.

This first one was a big piece - can't remember exactly, 2ft x 3 1/2 ft? Something like that. It was made to fit above the headboard of a couple's master bedroom.

This next one was a gift for a child care provider who was retiring her business. The parents wanted to give a meaningful parting gift that incorporated the logo:

So I came up with this:

family trees:

If you have an idea for a custom order (a favorite quote or bible verse? family names? a family tree? family rules? anything else you can dream up?).... and want to learn more about our prices and process, email us at paperprayers@hotmail.com and we'll send you some info!

Be sure to go check out our Custom Order tab in the menu bar - we just updated it with some new pictures!

True Love Cross Winner!

2011-06-09T22:09:00.000-05:00

We used the random number generator and it picked number #4 which is Sara of Sara's Art* House!!!

Congrats, Sara! You can email us at paperprayers@hotmail.com with your mailing address!

If any of you are interested in purchasing your own True Love cross, you can buy it online here.

Did you know that there are other crosses in our line "This Thing Called Family?" Here's a look :

Clicking on their pictures will take you to the same site above if you want to purchase one of your own!

Go Check out Ben Franklin in Iowa City!

2011-06-07T11:41:00.002-05:00

Remember our announcement that Ben Franklin in Sycamore Mall, Iowa City was going to be carrying "This Thing Called Family?" I know many of you locals have been patiently waiting! Well they've now got an awesome display going on and lots of inventory!!! It looks like they have just about everything, except maybe the pillows.

Here are some pictures:

They have all 3 styles of lazy susans in stock!

All three big wall art styles are available: Count your Blessings, Table Manners and Family Rules.

Mirrors, ornaments, crosses, fabric wall hangings, wall art, owl sculpture.

So if you're local to the Iowa City area, THIS is the place to go! We told LOTS of people over Arts Fest weekend about it too, so you might want to get over there while the selection is good!

We're hoping to have a "meet the artists" event there and will let you all know the details as soon as they are finalized!

A Warm Welcome and a Giveaway to Celebrate!

2011-06-06T11:34:00.003-05:00

*THE GIVEAWAY BELOW IS NOW CLOSED.

BIG thanks to all who came out and made the Iowa Arts Fest a success!!!! We're still recovering!

See more pics of the festival on our facebook page!

If you're new and joining us for the first time, we are SO glad that you are here!!! We wish you a Warm Welcome! And you're in luck! To celebrate this past weekend, we're starting a new giveaway today!

But first, let us show you around!

If you're interested in finding out more about the Things With Wings family, head here.

If we talked to you this weekend about a custom order, you can get ideas (but are certainly not limited to these) by heading here.

This Thing Called Family

If you'd like to learn and see more pictures of "This Thing Called Family" -our national line of wall art and home decor items with DEMDACO, (pictured above) including where you can find it in your area, go check out this section. Be sure to check out the lazy susans - they've been really popular!

Many of you asked this weekend about purchasing items directly from our website. Although our blog here is not set up that way, we do have several options for you:

*We have 2 etsy shops (see menu bar) that have been sorely neglected! We've been so busy that stuff sells long before we have time to get up on there! A good problem to have! But our goal this summer is to update them with new original items. We will make announcements via facebook when that happens!

*Items from "This Thing Called Family" can be purchased from a few online shopping sources that we've connected with:
Gabby's Gifts
The Village Shop
...and if you're local to the Iowa City area, go visit Ben Franklin's in Sycamore Mall -they have a great selection right now!

*If you see something here on our blog or facebook that you like, email us and we'll let you know if we still have it! We use paypal and ship things all the time!

Lastly, we would LOVE it if you'd join us on our facebook page. It's a great way to connect and we update it with pictures and info way more often than our blog! *If you purchased something from us this past weekend, we'd love to see it in your space!!! Post a picture on our facebook wall and we will repost it for all to see!

Whew! NOW on to the giveaway!

Here it is!

Our "True Love Cross!" This cross is one of a few crosses that are available in the "This Thing Called Family"collection. It is made from wood composite, canvas and has an iron wire hanger. It's 15 inches long. DEMDACO tells us the crosses are selling really well, so we're excited to be giving one away!

To Enter:

*just leave a comment on this post and tell us how you first connected with Things With Wings (if you can remember!) Nothing simpler! Make sure there's a way we can contact you.

***If, in your one comment, you mention that you've also facebooked, blogged, or tweeted the giveaway, we'll throw in an extra surprise! (you know from our other giveaways that it'll be something good!)

*We will choose a winner on Thursday night, 10 pm CST.

*One entry per person, please! Extra comments will be deleted. Your comment will not be immediately visible until after we've approved it.

Good luck and a special welcome to all you new folks!

Iowa Arts Festival is THIS Weekend!!!

2011-06-03T15:19:00.001-05:00

Iowa Arts Festival is THIS WEEKEND!!!!

Downtown Iowa City!

We'll be booth #98, the east block of Washington Street.

Hours: 10-6 Saturday, 10-4 on Sunday

Hope to see you there!

New Creative Works by Connie (Mamma Winger)

2011-05-24T14:57:00.000-05:00

This past weekend I took some photos of some of our mom's new pieces. Here are some of our favorites!

Her most popular new ones were these that she took pieces of trims and moldings and made a 'frame' around the edges.

*All pieces in this post were lovingly created by Connie!

Valley Junction Spring Art Market 2011

2011-05-23T20:09:00.002-05:00

Here are some pics we took of yesterday's art market in Des Moines. The wind gusts were challenging, but it never rained! We had a great turnout! Lots of supportive loyal customers, lots of new faces, and we got to meet Alisa, the DEMDACO sales rep for the DM area. (She, along with other Iowa reps, are helping us line up some signing events for later this year!)

We decided to make a new "Things With Wings" sign to reflect our new adventure over the last year:

One retailer who has a shop in Jefferson, Iowa called Country Blessings, stopped in our booth because she was worried that we were trying to copy the new line she was excited to pick up this year for her store called "This Thing Called Family." :-) When she saw our sign, she put it all together! She said how funny it was that she had gone all the way to the Atlanta gift market to find Iowa artists!

We were surprised by how many people recognized our Demdaco line, and/or had seen our article in the Des Moines Register. Several commented how different and colorful our originals are than "This Thing Called Family." (And I'm SURE it was a compliment!) We are always coming up with new stuff and our work continues to evolve. So just WAIT until you all see what we've got up our sleeves for 2012 with DEMDACO!!! We are so. excited. It just keeps getting better and better and reflects even more of our artistic personalities! That's all we can really say about that right now!

Now it's time for us to regroup and keep plugging away to prepare for the Iowa Arts Festival, taking place in downtown Iowa City, June 4-5. That's just 2 weeks away! Yikes!

Valley Junction Spring Art Market 2011

2011-05-18T17:17:00.000-05:00

Here's what we're going to be doing this Sunday in Des Moines, and you're all invited!

Here's a link to the event and directions.

Here's a sneak peek at some new stuff that will be there!

ModPodge and the Gospel

2011-05-17T13:59:00.002-05:00

Friday I went to a local store and bought a number of art supplies, one of which was MODPODGE. I had some pieces to finish up for a show this weekend and on Monday I was all set to ModPodge, but it wasn't in the bag with the other things I'd purchased. I hunted all over for it, even checked the car. hmmm......wonder if it's still at the checkout! So I called the store and they said it wasn't there, but if I came in, they'd give me another one. So I made another trip over, explained it to the checkout person....fine....went home and finished my projects. Now today I find that the original "lost" jar of mod podge had apparently rolled out of the bag and underneath my couch! (notice it has lost its capital letter status with me temporarily). I am tired, frustrated, and still have lots to do this week. Do I want to run back over to that store again? no......is it really a big deal?........no.......but God is not going to let me off the hook that easily, I already know it without even trying it. So, as much as I don't want to, I get in the car and take the modpodge back into the store. I thought about asking for the manager - maybe he or she would give me great kudo's or something - but remembering it's not a big deal, I just went to the checkout person and explained my situation. After sounding like a complete scatterbrain, I went ahead and purchased the extra jar (heaven knows I'm gonna need it anyway!) Then she quietly said,"hey, thanks for being honest!" I fell back into my car and was thinking, dang! I'm tired! when the radio announcer says, "are you just so darn tired of trying to do the right thing? well, fall on Jesus and rest on Him!" WOW! talk about timing! He cares about all the stupid little things I do. EVERYTHING is about HIM! -MOM Winger

Mirror and Ring Winners (FINALLY!)

2011-05-16T20:06:00.000-05:00

We've tried to be patient. Really we have. And you all have been extremely patient. But who knows if blogger will ever return our missing give-away comments to us!

As many of you know, the latest giveaway was supposed to have ended on Thursday night last week.
Blogger experienced some major hiccups, and stuff got ugly there for awhile. We are still missing 24 comments. It didn't seem fair to draw winners without them! So we waited patiently, and then not so patiently, and then we got smart and realized that I had my email set up so that all my give-away blog comments were automatically sent to a separate forgotten folder. So that's what we're going with - 71 entries - and you'll just have to trust us on this one!

So, we had the random number generator pick 4 numbers, and here's what it chose: 48, 9, 58, 53.

The first winner is for our "Be Grateful" mirror above. It's from our new line "This Thing Called Family." #48 was....

Steve Lindemann!!!!! who said this:

"I'm grateful for the opportunity to homeschool my kiddos :)"

Congrats!!!

Now for the 3 ring winners:

#9 was Francine!!!!! --- "I am so grateful for my wonderful son, he is only going to be 17 but he is one heck of a kid! Love you Joe"

happy birthday, Joe!

#58 was Heather!!!!! --- "I am so thankful for my husband, son and the little baby boy that is on the way!! :-)"

How exciting, Heather!!!!

#53 was Andrea!!!!! --- "I'm grateful for my best friend, who gave me the greatest gift this week, which is the one-year anniversary of my dad's death from colon cancer (it's preventable - get screened at age 50!). She gave me helium balloons with notecards where I could write to my dad and then release them. 'I know he's in Heaven,' she told me. 'Tell him whatever you want.' I know, too, and that love, and that compassion, is Heaven on Earth. <3"

Anniversaries are soooo hard, Andrea. But what a good friend you've got!!! She sounds like a keeper. :-) We lost our dad in 1997 when he was only 52. So we know a little how you feel. It doesn't feel like it now.....but it does get easier.

Email us at paperprayers@hotmail.com with your mailing addresses!

*Here's an online shopping site where you can purchase your own "Be Grateful" Mirror!

*Visit the store locator to find retailers near you who carry "This Thing Called Family!"

MORE give-aways to come!

The latest Blogger Update:

2011-05-13T22:00:00.001-05:00

Tonight blogger says: "Nearly all posts since Wednesday are restored, now bringing back comments from last couple days. We expect the comments to be back this weekend or sooner."

So let's give it through the weekend and see if the missing giveaway comments return before we decide about the giveaway, ok!

*Even if your comment is one that is currently missing, please hold off on re-entering the drawing until we decide what we're going to do! Hopefully, as stated above, comments are still being restored. thanks!

Blogger is not Making Anyone Happy Right Now.

2011-05-13T13:22:00.001-05:00

Many of you already know that blogger has been out for at least 24 hrs now. Even though blogger is back up for us, there are still things missing. I know a TON (30+) of entries for our giveaway are gone. HOPEFULLY this is temporary. :-( Blogger says they are still working on restoring posts. If you've already entered our latest giveaway but your comment is missing, PLEASE do NOT comment again! Let's give it some more time and wait and see if everything is restored. We aren't picking any winners yet. Hopefully we won't have to scrap the whole giveaway and start over. sigh.

This link has more info on what happened, and why some things are still missing. Hopefully all comments will be back in the coming hours!

thanks for your patience in the meantime!

Giveaway Time! "Be Grateful" Mirror!

2011-05-09T07:00:00.015-05:00

It's time for another giveaway! We've got lots to be excited about this week! We're always eager to celebrate "This Thing Called Family!" And this week we're also jumping for joy over our recent Cloth Paper Scissors STUDIOS feature!

So this time we're giving away our "Be Grateful" mirror!
It measures 10" square and is made from wood composite, canvas and the mirror.

The dimensional heart is textured metal and the words are wood composite and raised as well.

To Enter:

Leave us ONE comment -

Tell us something that you are grateful for today!

(Be sure to leave a way to contact you.)
*Don't worry if your comment doesn't show up immediately. It won't be visible until after we've approved it.

I'm grateful for homemade mother's day presents. And kisses. Both the chocolate variety and the husband variety. :-)

We don't care for jumping through hoops and completing a million steps before you can enter and we don't expect you to either. We think everyone should have an equal shot at winning.

BONUS PRIZE!

IF, however you help us spread the word about our giveaway, (TOTALLY optional!) there IS a little bonus!

***IF, in your ONE comment you ALSO tell us that you facebooked, tweeted, or blogged about our giveaway, I'll throw in your choice of one of these fun cocktail rings (see below) that I've been experimenting with!

Here's a link to this post you can cut and paste if you want:

http://thingswithwingsartjournal.blogspot.com/2011/05/giveaway-time-be-grateful-mirror.html

I found this super cool tutorial from Hambly Screen Prints blog on how to make these awesome paper cocktail rings. Made some adaptations and changes, and voila! Mamma Winger even got one for Mother's Day!

SO.

If you win and you've shared our giveaway, you can pick your choice from one of these four rings pictured and I'll send it along with our "Be Grateful" mirrror!!!!

(The rings are just for fun. They have an adjustable ring. And they're made from metallic paper. They have been mod podged inside and out and are more durable than you'd think, but they ARE made from paper. And super cute. And would be fun to wear on a night out.....When you don't plan on doing dishes......Or washing your hands.)

***Aww HECK! You talked us into it......Why don't we give away the other three rings too?! We'll pick three more random winners for the other three rings!

So why wouldn't you enter?! And why wouldn't you tell everybody you know?!

We'll pick one "Be Grateful" mirror + ring (hopefully) winner and 3 other ring winners on Thursday (May 12) at 10pm CST.

Good Luck, Friends!

Moms Rock.

2011-05-08T07:00:00.008-05:00

Happy Mother's Day, friends!

You do, you know....you rock. Your family might not always know it or might need reminding from time to time. But you are so loved, Moms. You may feel invisible and under appreciated at times, but God sees the work you are doing.

-Love from the Things With Wings family.

*Come back and see us tomorrow - we're starting a NEW GIVE AWAY!!!!

Cloth Paper Scissors STUDIOS Summer Issue!!

2011-05-06T16:20:00.000-05:00

We have some exciting news!

WE are in the newest issue of Cloth Paper Scissors STUDIOS magazine!

It's the summer edition and it just came out. We received our copies yesterday, so it should be on the newstands soon if it isn't already! Three copies all arrived at my (Jill's) house but I was under strict orders to not open the package until we could all look at it together....talk about torture!

Here's what the cover looks like:

We are in the special Mother-Daughter section :-) Our names are over there on the left, along with some other fabulous mothers and daughters. Mamma Winger's flower made it on the title page of that section!

We have 4 pages (p 58-61) inside this section where we tell more of the Things With Wings story of why we do what we do and the inside scoop on + pictures of each of our three studios! You'll have to run out and buy a copy to see for yourselves!

Here you can see the table of contents and all the good stuff this issue has:StudiosSumm2011TOC
<br>W

We owe Samantha Bender of SB Photography a big THANK-YOU for taking pictures of each of our studios!

You can purchase the summer edition here! You can usually find it at bookstores and arts and crafts stores too!

*Stay tuned Monday because we will start ANOTHER exciting giveaway of "This Thing Called Family" product!!!

Owl Doorstop WINNER + an EXTRA prize!

2011-04-29T22:42:00.000-05:00

It's time to announce a winner for our owl doorstop! This was a challenge to tally! A few of you were having trouble commenting and got an error. So I added your facebook entries to the end of the line. We also made sure to be accurate with everyone just getting one entry, since there were a few accidental 2nd entries by people. Just want to make sure everyone knows that this was done as fairly and accurately as we know how!

So with out further ado....The random number generator picked number 31!

So the winner of the owl doorstop is Mod Podge Amy!!!! Congrats Amy! Amy is going to name her new doorstop Hubbard!!! Congrats to Hubbard. We will miss you - may Amy's 3 dogs be kind to you!

And since you facebooked about our giveaway Amy, you also get this little handmade owl plaque thrown in too!!!

ALSO we were SO overwhelmed with your enthusiasm, thoughtfulness, and humorous owl names, so we decided to pick a special EXTRA gift for the owl name that we liked best. It was HARD to choose - there were so many good ones! In the short list were Pudge McHooterson, Whodat, Punkie Doodles, and Owlove.

But, we finally decided on......

"Holdadora" by Karina as our winner! Here's exactly what Karina said,

"He's really cute :) The most brilliant name I think would be " Holdadora" cos that what he does :) You could call it Dora for short:) Think Im tired :)"

Karina, sometimes brilliant things come to us when we're half loopy! :-) You've won an owl plaque as well!

Amy and Karina, please email us your mailing addresses! paperprayers@hotmail.com

THANK you to everyone so MUCH for taking the time to stop in and play along with us! We will be starting ANOTHER giveaway soon!!!!

*Disappointed you didn't win the doorstop? Go to the store locator and find a retailer near you that carries This Thing Called Family!

Name Our Owl Giveaway!!!

2011-04-28T07:00:00.020-05:00

THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED. ANOTHER ONE WILL BE HAPPENING SOON!!!

So what would you name this guy?

Well, if you win him, you can name him whatever you want!

We're giving away our chunky, hunky Owl Doorstop!

He measures 8 inches high and is made from 100% cotton, weighted with sand and has polyester fiberfill stuffing. He's built like a tank with a weighted bottom, so he's not going anywhere! I hope that he doesn't cost a fortune to mail to the winner! His eyes and beak are stitched on in a way that's really cool and add texture. He gets along quite well with this crazy bunch from This Thing Called Family.

To enter, listen carefully:

Leave ONE comment - and tell us what you would name this owl. Your comment will not be visible until we've approved it. Be sure to leave a way to contact you.

*But WAIT!!!

IF in your ONE comment you ALSO tell us that you facebooked or tweeted about our giveaway, I will personally throw in an extra handmade Things With Wings surprise!!!! I even promise you you'll love it, or at least really, really like it.

Remember, only ONE comment per person. BUT you could also get a lil sumpin'-sumpin' extra for spreading the word about our giveaway! If you don't feel like sharing the news, or aren't a facebooker or twitter-er (tweeter?) that's OK, you'll still win the doorstop.... You'll just always have to wonder what that extra Things with Wings thing could have been....

To make it super quick and easy, cut and paste this, including the link:

Things With Wings is giving away their owl doorstop - just for giving the owl a name!! Enter here: http://thingswithwingsartjournal.blogspot.com

This is going to be a quick one! We will choose a winner tomorrow- on Friday, April 29 at 10 pm.

*please understand that due to the weight of this item, this giveaway is open to US residents only please!

Wish Star Winner!

2011-04-27T22:14:00.001-05:00

We have a giveaway winner!

The random number generator picked #7 ------Heather --------whose wish was this:

"I wish I could lose weight without trying! :)"

Don't we all, Heather. Don't we all....

Email us at paperprayers@hotmail.com to tell us your mailing address!

Congrats, Heather on winning our Wish Plaque!

***You will all DEFINITELY want to come back tomorrow and see what we're giving away next! We're ready to start the next giveaway!

New Giveaway Today - Make a Wish!

2011-04-25T13:50:00.006-05:00

*THIS GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED.*

Here's a new giveaway for you! We're giving away our wish plaque - one of our star ornaments from "This Thing Called Family!" It is made from wood composite, canvas, and iron wire. It measures 10" w x 9" h.

To enter, leave a comment here on our blog and make a wish on our star. Big or Small. Funny or Serious. It doesn't have to be anything monumental. Right now, I wish my three year old would stop trying to get me to smell his blanky. It's not pleasant.

(Be sure to leave us a way to contact you too!)

{Ya'll know WE aren't wish granters, right? God isn't a magic genie either, but we do have a God who cares and hears each time we call, and knows our hearts even when we don't have words.} There is something special about writing a wish down, though. It focuses our hearts on something we are working toward. And it'll get you entered into our drawing!

One entry or "wish" per person please.
Your comment will not be immediately visible until we've approved it.

If you want to see all of the other ornaments in our collection, (there are more stars, houses and hearts!) take a peek on Gabby's Gifts. And if you can't wait to see if you've won and need to buy one NOW, they are all available for purchase there as well!

We will choose a winner Wednesday night, 10 pm CST.

*Tell your friends to come make a wish too! One simple way you can do this is to copy and paste the following, with the link included, to your blog or facebook:

Make a wish on a star and enter the Things With Wings giveaway!
http://thingswithwingsartjournal.blogspot.com/2011/04/new-giveaway-today-make-wish.html

Happy Easter!

2011-04-23T12:12:00.000-05:00

Wishing you all a peaceful Easter weekend! We are getting ready to have a big Things With Wings family dinner today, complete with a 175 plastic egg hunt outside for our 6 kids to find! The sun was peeking out earlier, but it's overcast AGAIN now.... It seems spring is taking its time coming! We are celebrating the miracle and wonder of new life in all its many beautiful forms this weekend. It all points toward One Divine Source. "Our Lord has written the promise of the resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in spring-time." ~Martin Luther

We have SO much to be thankful for. Celebrating Earth Day too: for the earth He so creatively created! And the stars as well - He knows them EACH by name! This video is amazing. It was filmed by TSO Photography on Spain's highest mountain between April 4-11, 2011. The milky way is amazing! What a beautifully complex, creative and wondrous world God has created!

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Happy Easter!

We have a Winner!

2011-04-19T22:11:00.002-05:00

We have a giveaway winner! The random number generator picked #30: Andrea G. who said this:

"So exciting! It is so wonderful how the Lord has blessed you ladies with you talents and how you keep using them to glorify Him and He keeps blessing you and then you keep blessing others. How beautiful!!"

Those are sweet and humbling words. May we never forget why we're doing this!

Congrats, Andrea on winning one of our winged ornaments! Thanks to all who entered - there are going to be a lot more chances coming up! We will be starting a new giveaway very, very soon!