Art is a Great Gift

Long ago and far away, I think it was in January, we had our staff holiday party and I realized what an art loving, crafty bunch we are. Handmade cards and drawings and beads and journals and other goodies were flowing in abundance.

Becky made everyone these little egg cups (at least that's how I think of them) from paper mache.

Mine had a little "J" inside it and the words were all kinds of writing about flowers and mist and dew and lots of ephemeral things like that. I loved it.

And then we did a gift exchange and (lucky me) I got this beautiful miniature book framed in a small shadowbox that Becky made.
Wow did I feel rich. So much art made me want to luxuriate in it and so I decided to redo my mantle.

One of the great things about collecting art is that over the years you end up with a treasure trove of possibilities when it comes to putting together a vignette. So I mined my house for treasures and came up with these paper spoons made by Clare Goddard. They were paper and they were white - like Becky's egg but different so I thought they'd be able to have an interesting conversation together.

Then away with all the holiday goodies and on to the cool, spare, clean lines of the winterscape.
Here's my new winter mantle - Becky's art, Sue Tackmier card, the Clare Goddard spoons, and bare huckleberry branches. I like the objects all clustered together instead of spread out.
They become something greater than the sum of the parts.