Missouri Botanical Garden Green Art and Craft Show

This weekend, November 13 and 14, Secret Leaves will participate in the Garden Gate Shop Green Art and Craft Show at the Missouri Botanical Garden. The event will run Saturday and Sunday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the upper level of the Ridgway Visitor Center.

If you've never been, the Missouri Botanical Garden is a wonderful place--one of my favorite places in St. Louis. And the gift shop, the Garden Gate, lives up to the standards of the rest of the garden. Beautiful plants, books, stationery, bath and body items, home and garden decor and more, expertly curated with a garden theme.

At the Green Art and Craft Show, I am focusing on affordable items and lots of holiday goods: gift tags, gift wrapping accessories, gift boxes, gift bags, etc. Here are some of the items Secret Leaves will offer:


Christmas stamp cards


An assortment of gift tags


Muslin gift bags perfect for small gifts like jewelry, candles, soap, etc.


Vintage Paper key tags


Gift enclosures and place cards


Greeting cards, stationery, journals, notebooks and more...

My friend Jen from Angelina Accoutrements will be there too, offering her lovely recycled cashmere pieces:







Lots of other vendors will be plying their recycled and eco-friendly wares, including jewelry, sculpture, handbags and more. I hope to see you there!

Sharon

An Etsy treasury or two

I have been featured in a few Etsy treasuries lately, which inspired me to create a couple myself. Here is my second treasury, Inkadinkadoo, which I like quite a bit. The theme is, of course, ink.

Here are a few highlights:


Pen and ink drawing from Nan Larson

 Vintage ink bottles from Sushipotparts


Vintage ink bottle from TwoVintageAvenue
Here's a look at my first treasury, titled, appropriately enough, Secret Leaves:
I paid a lot of attention to the color palette of this one.

Some highlights:


Fern leaf halter from Inleaf. This toddler tog was a collaboration between Inleaf and periwinklebloom.


Vintage leaf buttons from The Rusty Pig


Embroidered leather business card holder from Bees'Netta
I keep seeing such wonderful items while doing this post, that I am going to sign off now and do some shopping on Etsy.
Happy autumn to you,
Sharon

Missouri Botanical Garden - one of my favorite places

Last weekend, we had company visiting from out of town. As I always do when I have out-of-town visitors, I took them to the Missouri Botanical Garden. And why wouldn't I? Within walking distance of our house, it is one of my favorite places not only in St. Louis, but one of my favorite places, period. I didn't take many photos this trip, but I did get kind of fixated on dragonflies in the lily pond facing the Climatron. Here are a few of the shots. As always, click for larger view:

Black lily pond, which faces the Climatron at one end and a beautiful little glassed-in pavilion at the other.


Dragonfly perched on a tropical water lily




Dragonfly with what I think is the ecto-skeleton of one of his comrades.



Elsewhere in the Garden:

The peaceful and meditative Chinese Garden. One of my favorite spots.


Green bud festooned with a spider web


Scarlet-red coneflower

If you are ever in St. Louis...
Sharon

Ode to the Lake

Last weekend, our extraordinary friends and neighbors, Jan and Connor, lent us their newly purchased lake house for the weekend. It is at Lake of the Ozarks, a sprawling resort area in central Missouri. Lake of the Ozarks was created when the Osage River was dammed, resulting in a large reservoir. Over the years, it has been heavily developed, with many high-end hotels, upscale homes and condominium complexes springing up. But that is not the Lake of the Ozarks we experienced.
Jan and Connor's lake house is a charming little cottage with red sideboards, butter-colored shutters and window boxes full of flowers. It sits on a sleepy cove with neighbors who are mostly year-round residents. From the deck, the sun glinting off the lake's surface looks like a million paparazzi's flash bulbs. The water is warm, the sun is hot and the occupants of the occasional boat wandering into our little corner of the Lake wave hello. Birds rustle busily in the trees overhead, and at night insects play their buzzing song.



 




BAGNELL DAM STRIP
Within walking distance is the Bagnell Dam strip. Full of arcades, tourist shops and ice cream stands, it is a throwback to an earlier era. My husband Michael, who spent his summers on the Lake many years ago, was astounded by how little it had changed. At night, it is a spectacle of neon lights, garish signs and strange, giant statues of Indian chiefs and lumberjacks. I couldn't wait to snap some photos. Click for a larger view:
Bumper cars and Skee ball


Glowing man

50 cent baseball

Dogpatch Arcade

Zamperla



Your weight and horoscope

Rebel Arcade

Thanks, Jan and Connor. We can't wait to go back.
Sharon 

A steampunk-ish journal with some history and romance

Years ago, I purchased a pair of 1930s leather motorcycle pants at an estate sale. They were jodhpur style with canvas-lined pockets and they laced up at the waist like football pants. The leather was a rich, warm brown, beautifully weathered and worn. They were wonderful. For a long time now, I have been wanting to make a leather journal out of them and I finally did. The journal/sketchbook was given as a thank you gift to a friend of mine who is an artist.



The journal fits down inside a canvas bag fashioned from one of the pants pockets.

 
The journal's wraparound cover is cut from one of the pant legs. I believe the fore-edge of the wrap is the hem of the pant leg.
 


I added a metal stud where the stitching on the leather terminates.
 


The rawhide tied around the journal is the lacing out of the pants. Click for a larger view to see the wires wrapping around the ends of the rawhide lacing. This is an original detail.
 



The book has three signatures, each wrapped in a piece of handwritten sheet music from an Italian-American Marine band composer. I got two boxes full of his hand-written musical scores at an estate sale on The Hill, the Italian neighborhood of St. Louis.
 


The book is bound with a long stitch, or more
accurately, running stitch.
 

It's got kind of a steampunk feel, don't you think?
I hope he enjoys it.

Sharon

Scrap Journals in the Etsy shop

I just listed two Scrap Journals in the Etsy store. For those of you not familiar with the Scrap Journal, it is a hand-bound, recycled journal with bits of vintage ephemera for its pages. It is a relatively petite book at 4 1/2 x 6 inches.
The first one has a lovely color scheme, which is echoed throughout the interior pages. The graphics on the old sheet music cover are pretty fantastic too. Be sure to click on images for a larger view:




 

I love the swirling pattern on the cover of the second one. It reminded me of Spring rain, so I found an image to decoupage on the front of a girl dressed in flower petals and carrying an umbrella to shield her from Spring showers:







Available here and here.
Sharon